AN OCCUPIED CAVE DWELLING

Early next morning we made a start from our camp on the cañon's side, by the light of the pitch-pine torches, and climbed over and out of the deep gorge into a more open country, where the sunlight could penetrate. Here the trail was of velvety softness, and we surprised a number of cave-dwelling Indians sitting and standing about their homes among the big bowlders. The only garments they had on were ragged breechcloths of cotton, but some had the extra adornment of a strip of red cloth about their shocky black hair. The air was intensely cold, so much so that we were wrapped in our heaviest coats, but these savages apparently did not feel the cold, and if they shivered at all it was probably at the sight of us—for their fear was quite evident—and it was plain they longed to beat a retreat to their huge rocky homes; but they stood it out till we passed, and then in an instant they vanished.

HOME OF CAVE DWELLER.

Before this day's march was ended we passed through a little Tarahumari mountain town called Churo. It was in a small circular valley, and on all sides were the steep, high peaks of the mountains. Here the Indians had tried to raise a few apples, but the trees were gnarled and twisted, and the apples not much larger than those of wild crab trees, although much sweeter to the taste. Of course there was no store of any kind in the little settlement, and if Mexicans, passing through the place, wished to obtain anything from the Indians, their method was to take it, placing whatever they considered its equivalent in silver before the Indian, and leaving it for the latter to accept. If asked to sell any of their produce or set a price on it, the Indians stolidly refuse, even though the price may be two or three times greater than they could possibly obtain at the nearest Mexican mining town. They know nothing of the value of gold, and paper money they utterly refuse; silver is the only money they will take even in this reluctant fashion.

TARAHUMARI TOWN OF CHURO.

Upon reaching Cusihuiriachic I found that my Winchester rifle had been left in the stage office in Chihuahua. I sent back word to forward it by next stage to Carichic, but as the next stage did not arrive at that place for four or five days we would have just that much start of it in the mountains, and we therefore at that place engaged a Tarahumari Indian boy to bring it whenever it did arrive. The gun reached Carichic at noon of one day, and early the next forenoon the young Indian appeared on our trail with it, having made the distance in one night and a little over half a day. Of course he must have used many short cuts across the country of which we were ignorant; nevertheless it was quite a feat, for the distance traveled by us was about 110 miles.

From Carillo Cajon, where our last camp had been, to the westward and southwestward the scenery steadily becomes grander and more mountainous; until the Grand Barranca of the Urique is reached it fully equals the Grand Cañon of the Colorado at any point on its course. Long before, indeed, on our southward march beautiful vistas break to the right and the left, and especially to the east. About five o'clock one afternoon, just as we were emerging from a dense forest of high pines, and little thinking of seeing stupendous scenery, we suddenly came to the very edge of a cliff fully 1000 feet high, and from which we could look down 4000 to 5000 feet on as grand a scene of massive crags, sculptured rock, and broken barrancas as the eye ever rested on. It was already late in the afternoon, so I determined to remain over a day at this point and devote it to camera and cañon. This camp on the picturesque brink of the Grand Barranca I called Camp Diaz, after Mexico's president.

The Grand Barranca of the Urique is one of the most massive pieces of nature's architecture that the world affords. It is quite similar in some respects to the Grand Cañon of the Colorado, and this is the nearest to which I can compare it in the United States. The latter, grand as the scenery undoubtedly is, soon tires by its monotonous aspect of perpendicular walls in traveling any distance, while the Grand Barranca could be followed as far as it deserves the name of "grand" and every view and every vista would have some startling and attractive change to please the eye. It is a "cross" between the Grand Cañon of the Colorado and the Yosemite Valley—if we can imagine such scenery after seeing both. Were the Urique River navigable, fortunes could easily be made by transportation lines carrying tourists to and fro, provided even only one terminus connected with some well-established line of travel. But unfortunately it is not navigable, no amount of money could make it so, and all tourists or travelers who are afraid of a little work or roughing it will miss one of the most magnificent panoramas. It is simply impossible to crowd into a pen-and-ink sketch or a photograph any adequate views of this stupendous mountain scenery. It is rather a field for an artist, who will put the product of his palette and brush on heroic-sized canvas, and make one of the masterpieces of the world. The heart of the Andes or the crests of the Himalayas contain no more sublime scenery than the wild, almost unknown fastnesses of the Sierra Madres of Mexico.

A VIEW THROUGH ROCK OPENING ACROSS THE GRAND BARRANCA OF THE URIQUE.

From the cliffs we were on, among the pines and cedars, we could look far down into the valley of the Urique with our field glasses and see the great pitahaya cactus, a product of the tropical climes. In between were the oaks and other products of temperate climates, showing us in a huge panorama nearly all the plant life from the equator to the poles. We sat on the bold, beetling cliffs, and could drink ice water from the clear mountain springs that threw themselves in silvery cascades below, and view the river far down in the valley, a perpendicular mile below us, the waters of which were so warm that we knew we could bathe in them with comfort. Away off across the great cañon were lights, as evening fell, beaming from the caves of the cliff dwellers on the perpendicular side of the mountain. Truly it was a strange, wild sight.

One of the lights that was "raised," as the sailors would say, in the evening, was in what seemed to be a perpendicular cliff on the opposite side of the mighty barranca, as near as we could make out in the gloom of the falling night. Its position was located, and, surely enough, on the next day our conjectures were verified, for we could see a few dim dottings showing caves, while to the main one led up a steep talus of débris that tapered to a point just in front of the entrance. Strangest of all, but a little way down the side of this very steep talus, so very steep that one would have had much difficulty in ascending unless there were brush to assist in climbing, we could easily make out, with the help of our glasses, that corn had been planted by these strange people. It seemed as if the tops of the dwarf plants were just up to the roots of the next row of corn above them, if they can really be said to have been planted in rows at all.

INTERIOR OF A CLIFF DWELLER'S HOME, SEVENTY-FIVE FEET
ABOVE THE WATER.

Much as I would have liked to visit the place, the condition of my mules and the state of my provisions made it clearly out of the question; moreover, I was informed that better chances to see cliff dwellers would present themselves before long, which statement, fortunately, was soon verified. Not far from Camp Diaz was a place where we could have tied our braided horsehair lariats together and let a person down one hundred to two hundred feet into the tops of some tall pine trees, and from there gain the first incline, which, though dizzily steep, I think would have led, by a little Alpine engineering, into the bottom of the big barranca four or five thousand feet below, and thence an ascent could be made to the caves of the cliff dwellers. But there were other and more potent considerations, which I have given, that prevented our attempting this acrobatic performance with the cliffs and crags as spectators. We might say that we were now out of the land of the living cave dwellers and in the land of the living cliff dwellers, although the latter live in caves in the cliffs. But I make the distinction between the two, of caves on the level of the ground in the valleys or the sides of mountains, and the caves in cliffs or walls. The latter are reached by notched sticks used as ladders, or, as I saw in a few cases, by natural steps in the strata of alternate hard and soft rock, and up which nothing but a monkey or a Sierra Madre cliff dweller could ascend. Many of these cliff houses in the caves and great indentations are one hundred to two hundred feet above the water of some mountain stream, over which they hang like swallows' nests. Truly they are a most wonderful and interesting people, well worth a large volume or two to describe all that is singular and different in them from other people, savage or civilized.

IN THE LAND OF THE LIVING CLIFF DWELLERS.

One of the most distinguishing characteristics of the Sierra Madre range, and one that will attract widespread admiration in the near future when this country is better known, is its wonderful rock sculpture. I do not think I exaggerate in saying that I passed hundreds of isolated sculptured rocks in one day. All sketches fail to give an idea of these beautiful formations. They must be seen to afford a conception of their beauty and grotesqueness. Undoubtedly they outrank all other ranges of North America and, as far as I can learn, of the whole world. Even the Garden of the Gods in Colorado is flat in comparison with some of the many miles of glorious rock formations in these grand old mountains. The trail from Camp Diaz to our fifth camp in the Arroyo de los Angelitos along the western side of the Grand Barranca of the Urique, was as picturesque as the most poetical imagination could conceive. The trail wound up and down the steep arroyos and along the edge of the high cliffs, giving views of unsurpassed beauty and grandeur. That night we slept for the last time under the somber pines and listened to the whip-poor-wills, for the next night we had descended seven thousand feet, and were among the oranges and palms, the paroquets and humming birds.

CHAPTER VIII.

As this was to be a most important day our small party on the crest of one of the high sierras was astir earlier than usual. Our camp had been made in a little glen between two peaks, alongside one of the numerous clear, cold streams that wind in and about through all these mountains, and furnish the loveliest and most picturesque spots imaginable for camping. Francisco, my chief packer, a bright, good-natured Mexican, was off long before sunrise, scouring the ridges and the gulches for the mules, as these animals often wander miles away at night, and in the morning all the available people in camp are turned out to look for them. This search sometimes wears well into the day before these frisky beasts are brought in; then some stray human member of the party has to be found, and when all this is accomplished it is nearly time to turn out the mules for another feed. On this particular morning fortune favored us, however, and soon our dejected-looking beasts were tied in line with the lariats, while we sat on the ground a short distance from them, each with a tin plate in our laps and a tin cupful of coffee in our hands. The night before an Indian had arrived at our camp, sent out from Urique by our Mexican friend, with roasted chickens and fresh eggs. The chickens had vanished on the evening of their arrival, but the eggs furnished us a royal breakfast with the usual bill of fare, bacon and coffee. An early morning in the Sierra Madres, even in midsummer, will make the teeth chatter. The only comfort one can get, after piling on heavy coats, is to pass the time in revolving about the camp fire just out of reach of the smoke till breakfast is ready. Any attempt at washing is sure to be a failure, for the water is as cold as ice and the fingers refuse to work in the frosty air; so it is generally about midday before dirt and the traveler cease to be companions. After we had thawed out with the hot coffee, and all the packs had been strapped on the mules, the animals were started ahead, with Francisco's assistant, a muscular Indian, running after them; then the saddles were placed on our worn-out beasts, and off we went with light hearts, for this day's ride was to take us to the large mining village of Urique, buried away in the depths of the Urique Barranca. We had been on the road about an hour, up hill and down dale, crossing innumerable mountain streams, and skirting the edges of precipices from which we caught glimpses of the beautiful valleys thousands of feet below, when we rounded the corner of an immense spur, climbed a high bald point of the mountain, and came suddenly to what appeared to be the end of land. We could now look out for miles into the great mining barranca, broken into innumerable crags and turrets, with ridges and banks of mountains piled high on every side, mountains of purple, red, yellow, and green, magnificent and fantastic, fading away into other barrancas to the right and left. Here we paused, seven thousand feet above the valley, and looked at the wonderful panorama spread before us, celebrated even among these grand old mountains—by the few who have penetrated their fastnesses—as one of the most famous views and formidable descents in the whole range. The guides carefully examined all the packs and saddles, and every strap and rope was tightened and made secure. All were directed to remain in their saddles, as the descent was too steep and the way too dangerous for walking, the path or trail being covered with loose rolling stones. We had been told to give the mules their heads, and trust to their being perfectly sure-footed, for in that respect a Mexican mule is about as certain as a mountain goat.

From "La Cumbra," or the crest of the Sierra Madres, we could look down in the valley of the Urique River, as I have said, something over a vertical mile. As we stood among the pines we could see the plantations of oranges far below, one of which, called "La Naranja"—the Spanish for orange—seemed almost under our feet; in fact it was not farther away in horizontal measure than it was vertical, or about a mile in both. The Barranca of the Urique was much more open at this point than where we had first struck it at Camp Diaz, but it was, nevertheless, fully as grand and sublime in its mighty scenery, although of quite another kind. The enormous buttresses, almost spurs of mountains, that stood out along the cañon-like sides of the former, with their bristling, perpendicular fronts of thousands of feet in height, were now rounded off along the ridges with their vertical descents, and only their sides were straight up and down. In fact it was down these steep ridges that we must make our descent by zigzag trails that gave us a grade on which a mule could stand. Every time we came to the side of a ridge the trail hung over a precipice with a sickening dizziness to the rider until the mule could make the turn and get back on the descending trail. Occasionally it was necessary to leave one ridge for another far away that gave a better grade, and then we might have to skirt some cumbra, or crest, with walls practically vertical on either side, where, if we ever started to fall, we could guarantee ourselves one thousand five hundred to two thousand feet of plain sailing.

On the trail from Batopilas to Parral is the "La Infinitad" of the Mexican miners (the Infinity), where the trail, not over half a foot wide, looks down a sheer vertical twenty-six hundred feet.

Presently the pines begin to grow less numerous and to be interspersed with the many varieties of oak for which the Sierra Madres will one day be noted, the most conspicuous of which is the encino robles, or everlasting oak, a beautiful tree with enormous leaves of a bright green color. The oaks increase in numbers as we descend, and the pines soon disappear; for we are getting out of the country of cold nights, which the conifers love so much. Presently a thorny mesquite is seen, and in half an hour we have traveled from Montana to Texas, in a climatic way. On the cumbra we jumped off from our mules and ran along by the half hour in the cool, fresh mountain air. Now five minutes brings out our handkerchiefs to wipe our perspiring brows. The northern cactus will soon mingle with the mesquite, and then the great pitahaya tells us we are on the verge of the tropics, while each tree in the orange orchard just below us can be made out, and after a few more turns on the twisting trails, even the yellow oranges on the bright green trees become distinct. Another half hour and we are on the level, while not that length of time has been added before palms are over our head, and the heat is almost unbearable to those who have been for weeks on the high mountain tops of the cool sierras. In a little over four hours we dropped from the land of the pine to the land of the palm, and this too on mule-back, a feat that could be performed in few countries outside of Mexico. We were now out of the land of wild forests and wild men, back again among Mexican civilization, but of a kind almost unknown to the outside world, although one of the richest mining districts and one of the oldest points of colonization on the North American continent.

Our path was now lined with lovely, flowering, thorny shrubs, that stretched out and tried to scratch us, and often succeeded as we passed by. When we reached the little plateau of the first orange grove we rested awhile, and from here could look back to the cool place we had left but four short hours before. The way down from this resting place seemed steeper and longer than the first half of the journey; the heat became intense, the air throbbing and shimmering in the brilliant sunshine. Gayly colored paroquets and strange tropical birds went flitting past us and filled the air with their noisy calls and cries. The trail, however, had a persistent, unaccountable Indian method of keeping away from all shade, and wound among the thickest masses of thorny shrubs, which compelled us constantly to keep an eye on them, or be reminded in a manner more painful than pleasant. These, and the intense heat, made me long for the mountain life again. Although we had dropped from the crest of the range and land of pines to the land of palms, seven thousand feet, still we had many miles to wind up the great tropical barranca before we would reach the village.

FROM ORANGE PLANTATION TO CUMBRA, OR CREST OF MOUNTAIN,
SIX THOUSAND FEET. LOOKING BACKWARD.

One of the most dangerous places on the entire trail, about six hundred feet above the river, was where the mountain had apparently caved in on a sharp curve. This cave-in was directly under the trail, and here it crossed it with an abrupt turn around the point of the mountain. A small torrent had cut its way down at this point, and goats and other animals, when grazing on the steep slope above, had loosened quantities of stones and earth, which had fallen and built out a sort of ledge or shelf at the same point. This shelf projected over the great curve in the hill, and on approaching this place it looked as if a mule must either walk off with his fore feet or let his hind ones drop over the cliff in making the turn. Of course the trail was as narrow as possible for a trail to be and allow an animal to cling to it.

Through the kindness of Don Augustin Becerra there was sent out from Urique to the orange plantation a very large mule for my personal comfort. This animal was of the pinto variety and a fine traveler. After my desperate encounters with "Old Steamboat" it was positive luxury to ride him. He had some faults, however; he was fresh and fast, so kept well in advance of the rest of the train. When we neared this particularly dangerous place my mule took up a gentle trot and went pounding around the curve in a way that almost turned my hair gray, and I know we all breathed more freely after getting away from the perilous spot.

The Mexican town of Urique, numbering some three thousand people, was first established in 1612, years before the first pilgrim landed on Plymouth Rock, and yet it is as unknown as though in the interior of Africa. That living cave and cliff dwellers should be found but a little way off from the rough and even dangerous trail that leads to the secluded town which no one troubled himself to report to the world outside, shows what a wonderful isolation can exist and still be called civilization. The only way out of and into the town was on the back of the melancholy mule, and an old resident told me he believed that three-fourths of the people had never seen a wagon, not even the wooden carts of the Mexicans that so remind one of scriptural times; certainly no wagon or cart was ever hauled through the streets of Urique. In this deep barranca there is just room enough for the Urique River (a beautiful stream), and alongside of it, straggling out for a couple of miles or more, a row of houses hugging the banks of the stream, then a narrow street and a similar row of houses crowded up on the slope of the mountain. Back of this rise abruptly the steep, broken crests of the Sierra Madres. On the opposite side of the river there is only room now and then for a chance house that clings to the steep sides of the hills or burrows into them.

URIQUE FROM THE RIVER.

We rode with a great clatter up the single street lying white and still in the noonday sun, and had we not known that preparations had been made for us—as our arrival was anticipated by Don Augustin Becerra—we might have mistaken the place for a deserted village. After riding a mile through the street we reached a little plaza about twenty-five feet square, where the mountains receded and made room for this level little patch of ground. Here one of the great wooden doors of the apparently deserted houses opened and our host came forth, followed by a number of others. By the time the whole party reached the plaza there were one or two hundred Mexicans congregated to welcome us and see us alight. As there were no accommodations of any sort in the town for travelers, Don Augustin Becerra, with the graceful courtesy of a Mexican gentleman, had moved out of his own home and literally placed his whole house and all it contained at our disposal; and this was done as though it were the most commonplace thing in the world, and without the least sign of ostentatious politeness. I doubt very much whether any American under the same circumstances would have done as much. His father, Don Buenaventura Becerra, lived here also, and both united in showering on us the most acceptable acts of hospitality during our whole stay; and these were doubly welcome, coming as they did in such a spontaneous and wholly unexpected manner.

THE ONLY STREET OF URIQUE.

Urique is most interesting in that vast and substantial mineral wealth of which the little town is practically the center. The discovery of the rich district of Urique is to be attributed, so I am told, to the "adelantados" or "conquistadores," Spanish names equivalent to "adventurers," and then given to the commanders of expeditions organized but a short time after the conquest to explore the country and extend the domains of the Spanish crown. Directly overlooking this beautiful little mountain town is the Rosario mine, one of the principal mines of the district. Its ore runs from two hundred to two thousand dollars to the ton. In fact only the richest ores of any mine can be worked in the Central Sierra Madres, where everything is carried for hundreds of miles on mule-back at rates that would make a freight agent's mouth water. Salt for chlorination works, that we get for five to ten dollars a ton where there are railways, here costs from one hundred to one hundred and twenty-five dollars a ton, and even much more during the rainy season of about three months, when all the streams are swollen and the dizzy mountain trails are dangerous in the extreme. This rainy season in Northern Mexico lasts from about the first or middle of June until the middle of September. It is against such enormous odds that man has to battle with Nature in this secluded part of the earth in order to get at her wealth that is otherwise so lavishly strewn around. After one has passed ten or twelve days on the roughest of mountain trails in order to reach this point, and reflects that the discoverers must have been without even this poor aid to progress, one's respect for the old Spanish explorers of the seventeenth century is sure to be heartily accorded. They were undoubtedly a much hardier, more daring, persistent, and intrepid class of people than those who struck the Atlantic shores of our own country. But, great ghost of Cortes, how things have changed! It seems as if the will and energy of three centuries had been crowded into as many years, and then allowed to stand still, like a watch that loses its balance and spins off the twenty-four hours in nearly as many seconds.

LOOKING DOWN THE URIQUE BARRANCA TOWARD THE RIVER.

And right here I would refer to the frequent discussion of writers on Mexico as to whether Mexicans are opposed to the introduction of foreign labor and capital to develop their country. All around the town of Urique are to be found mines of gold and silver either operated or about to be operated by Americans, English, Germans, and other foreigners; while many other enterprises are starting toward this rich country opened by the Spanish before a white man had crossed the Alleghenies. I was therefore in a fair position to hear what their descendants had to say, and in giving it utterance let me compare them with our own countrymen. Individually the Mexican is never so bitter against foreigners as the American, although the latter nation is much more an aggregation of foreigners than the former, and of much later date from other countries. I often heard quite caustic comparisons from sensible Mexicans as to foreign methods of mining, railroading, etc., which I think were sometimes exaggerative, and they even expressed opposition to their coming in at all, but never in a manner so pronounced as with us.

The whole of the rich Urique district, formerly an old Spanish grant many square miles in extent, was granted the Becerra family of three brothers by the Mexican Government. Their wealth is reputed to be many millions, and this we could readily believe while passing through a portion of their vast possessions. There are now in the Urique district a dozen bonanza mines worked by the old Spanish system, which would yield enormous revenues if there were any method by which the ore could be transported at reasonable rates. From almost any point on the one street of the town you could look up the steep mountain sides and see three or four of these old Spanish mines. The method of working them was wholly on the same plan as that adopted a hundred years before, even the machinery being of the most primitive type.

That night I took a swim in the Urique River and found the water as warm as fresh milk, although the water I had used in the morning from some of its small tributaries on the cumbra was as cold as ice.

The post office in the little town was a most curiously primitive affair, being merely an awning of branches held up against a tree by a post in the ground. Under this an old man was seated on a chair; we saw nothing here to indicate a post office, but were assured this was the spot to deposit our letters. The man regarded me with surprise and distrust, and the sight of the three or four letters I wished to mail drew a large crowd. The old man could not read, and I told him where the letters were to go; then, after a great deal of jabbering among the crowd regarding the amount of postage, which I fortunately knew and told him, the letters were mailed by being deposited in an empty cigar box at his side, to be handed to the Indian mail carrier on his next trip out of Urique.

Our stay was unexpectedly prolonged by the illness of one of the party. It was the warmest season of the year in the deep tropical barranca, and the change from the cool mountain air of the high sierras was extremely trying to all. We found it was necessary to make an effort to bestir ourselves as far as sightseeing was concerned, but we dared to venture out only after sunset from our comfortable quarters in the thick adobe building. There was no twilight in the great cañon. Almost as soon as the sun disappeared behind the steep mountains darkness came; but the moonlight nights were simply glorious, transforming the tropical valley into a perfect fairyland; even the homely adobe houses were beautiful, and the most commonplace Mexican, in his great sombrero with a serape thrown gracefully over his shoulders, added a picturesque touch to the scene. Every available level spot of land in the valley had been turned by the owners into an orange grove or a ranch on which to raise fruits and vegetables for consumption by their families; and, as all the edible vegetation of nearly every clime grew there, their tables were always abundantly supplied.

INDIAN GIRL WINNOWING BEANS

In wandering along the river bank I noticed one very effective way the natives had to protect their gardens from the intrusions of the small boy or even smaller animals. On the top of a common adobe fence they planted a row of the cholla cactus, the most prickly of all that great family of needles. Even the agile cat could not get over nor around this formidable fence.

We made two ineffectual efforts to get away from Urique before we finally succeeded. In the first instance the packers did not arrive with the mules until noon, thinking by this ruse they would be able to camp in the valley instead of on the mountain, for they much prefer the tropical heat to the chill of the high mountains. The next time they were promptly on hand, but one of the party was too ill to sit up. The third time fortune favored us, and, after bidding adieu to our hospitable friends, we started for the famous Cerro Colorado mine, said to be the richest gold mine in all this part of Mexico. We followed the narrow mule trail that wound along the brawling river, hemmed in on either side by mountains towering three, four, and five thousand feet above us, and were well up the cañon before the first rays of the sun could reach us over the mountain tops. All along the trail the river was lined with beautiful flowering shrubs of every conceivable shade and color. Flitting around among them were brilliantly colored paroquets and many other birds with gay plumage. That morning's ride of ten or twelve miles up the cañon, sheltered as we were from the fierce rays of the sun—which emphasized and reflected the many-colored rocks of the mountains that were carved and sculptured into all beautiful and fantastic shapes—was one of such rare beauty and perfection that even the most graphic pen would despair of doing justice to the subject. About noon we crossed a small branch of the Urique River, for we had turned off from the main cañon into a smaller one, and then started up the steep mountain side. Up the weary mules scrambled and climbed for six long hours, resting now and then while we looked backward and downward at the land of the tropics, all wayside signs of which were fast disappearing. Just before leaving the Urique River we came to a native tannery, which was about as primitive an affair as any we saw in the whole Sierra Madres. For some two hundred yards along the wide river its bottom was white with outstretched hides held there by heavy stones on the upstream corners, and these hides were kept there for weeks to rid them of their hair. Of course we tasted but little of the water below that point. On enormous bent beams at the lower end was found a number of hides stretched, and naked men scraping them with sharpened stones. Despite the style of work, the leather they make is remarkably soft and pliable. An hour or two before our evening camp was made we were once more traveling along underneath the shade of the great somber pines, and the air seemed cold and unpleasant after our late tropical experience. As we had no tent with us, we simply spread our beds upon the soft pine needles and slept with the stars shining in our faces. At the first streak of daylight we were eating our breakfast, and shortly after were off over the velvety trail that led up the peaks and across many small barrancas toward the deep gorge in which was the celebrated Cerro Colorado mine.

INDIAN TANNERY

All this portion of the Sierra Madres is unsurpassed for magnificent and thrilling views over dizzy mountain trails. At many places one could look off into infinity from a ledge not over a foot and a half in width on which the mules must walk. Occasionally a steep wall of rock rises many hundreds of feet on one side and along this the mule will carefully scrape. The descent into Cerro Colorado was the most continuous steep I ever saw. Almost before we knew it we were in the tropics again, and that by an incline where, in a dozen places, the uphill rider on one zigzag could, without taking his foot out of the stirrup, kick off the hat of one below him on the other course as he passed.

Cerro Colorado is reputed to be the largest gold mine in the world, and was discovered as recently as 1888. That it should have remained so long unknown to any prospector in such a rich silver-mining district is one of the morsels of mining history, even a far greater mystery to me than that the existence of living cave and cliff dwellers on the rough mountain trails leading thereto should have been kept so long quiet. Cliff dwellers or angels in the air above them, or cave dwellers or demons in the earth under them would have attracted but little attention from a seeker of precious metals beyond the momentary astonishment at their sight.

VIEW IN MOUNTAINS, WITH CLIFF DWELLINGS, NEAR CERRO COLORADO.

The Cerro Colorado mine is an immense buttress or spur from the flank of the Sierra Madres, the whole spur showing signs of gold, not in any distinct vein, but in great masses distributed here and there through the mountain, a sort of "pocket" system, as miners would say. This great buttress or spur is 1800 meters (something over a mile) in length, 1200 meters in breadth, and 500 meters in height, and runs from $1 to $3300 a ton, as would be expected in the pocket system of deposits. Small deposits have been found of one hundred weight or so, however, that would run enormously—over $100,000 to the ton. The gold is not wholly in pockets, for it is found distributed in all parts of the great red hill, at least in the minimum of one dollar per ton. It requires eight mines to cover the tract properly. Enormous works were being put in to develop the property, and in a few years it will be known whether this is the largest gold mine in the world or not. It is the property of the Becerra brothers, and when I visited it Don José Maria Becerra was at the mine and spared no pains to make my stay pleasant. He was then engaged in placing the most improved machinery and constructing enormous works for water power, etc. He brought out and laid on a chair four great lumps of gold, of about the value of seventy thousand dollars, that had just been run out by the Mexican arastra, for they were still using the ancient method of mining, awaiting the arrival of the new machinery. Our host was preparing to start for London and Paris on business connected with his mine, and when we again heard of him it was the sad news of his death in London. This was not only a severe loss to his family, but a great blow to that portion of the country where his progressive energy had done so much to further its development.

CHAPTER IX.

After leaving Cerro Colorado, with its undeveloped possibilities, the trail leads southwestward through the broken barrancas toward Batopilas. This portion of the trail has been so improved by the energetic mine owners, and was so broad and smooth, that our mules could often take up a trot, which seemed doubly fast after our laborious plodding through the rough, unbroken portion over which we had passed. This trail had been built along some of the steepest cliffs and most rugged mountain sides, and must have been a work of great expense, for after every rainy season, lasting from June till September, these are badly washed out and require continuous repairs. The usual Mexican method is to abandon a badly washed trail and strike out in a new direction. Thus one finds all sorts of paths in the mountains, and it is necessary to have a good guide who knows the way thoroughly, or bring up suddenly on the washed-out ledge of an unused trail and then retrace your steps to its junction with another. Long before we reached Batopilas we came upon some of the massive work being constructed at that point, and were in a measure prepared for the energetic American activity, but not for the castle-like structure, the hacienda of San Miguel and San Antonio, as the home of ex-Governor Shepherd, the part owner and superintendent of those famous mines is called. Entering through a massive stone archway, we passed by some of the principal offices within the inclosure, and then on to the residence portion of the great conglomeration of buildings. Here our welcome was of the heartiest description, and everything possible was done for our comfort and pleasure. The great buildings were lighted by electricity and furnished with all modern conveniences, including hot and cold water, steam baths, and, an unusual luxury, an immense swimming pool, formed by a slight deflection of a portion of the Batopilas River. The many comforts of this place made us loath to leave it for the mountain trail.

I shall try and give my readers some slight idea of the wealth of this portion of a country so famous in early Spanish conquest. In those great, broken barrancas, leading out to the westward from the heart of the Central Sierra Madres, I found myself in the richest mineral district of America, and probably the richest in the world. The fact that this is not generally known (and, to tell the truth, but very little has ever been published in the English language about so rich a district, and that little is very old) would make it easy to write a book on this region alone, and still leave a great deal unsaid. One of the late cyclopedias says of Mexican mines, "Almost one-half of the total yield [of silver] is derived from the three great mining districts in Guanajuato, Zacatecas, and Catorce." Like most cyclopedias, this one was a little late in its information when printed, although it had an inkling of the truth in saying: "The State of Sinaloa is said to be literally covered with silver mines. Scientific explorers who visited the Sinaloa mines in 1872 reported that those on the Pacific slope would be the great source of the supply of silver for the next century." The fact is that the center of the greatest source of supply has moved even north of Sinaloa, to about the boundary line between the States of Chihuahua and Sonora, and about one-third of the way from its southern end. Taking either Batopilas or Urique as a base, and with a radius of 180 or 200 miles, that is, a diameter of 400 miles on them as a center, there is no doubt that the resulting circle will include the richest mining district in America, and probably in the world, both in a present and prospective sense. From within that circle comes a little over one-fourth the bullion of the whole of Mexico, although this area is insignificant compared with all the territory of that celebrated republic.

In 1864 a report of the mines of Mexico was expressly made for Napoleon III. by Dr. Roger Dubois, the French consul. He said as follows of those of Western Chihuahua: "Of all the States of the Mexican Republic, Chihuahua is, without contradiction, the richest in minerals, and we count no less than three thousand different leads, the greater part of which are silver." Probably three or four times that number could be added to Dr. Dubois' estimate of just a quarter of a century ago to bring it up to the present date, all of the new mines being in the Sierra Madres, where not one in a hundred can be worked unless of fabulous richness. One of the new railways projected into this part of Mexico made a most thorough examination of this mining belt to see what could be depended on for freight, and their chief engineer told me that no less than two thousand mines of silver that do not pay now could be made to do so by the cheap transportation of a railway. If one will reflect that there are now in the whole of Mexico but 1247 mines being worked (gold, silver, copper, lead, tin, and cinnabar), it is easy to see that my statement of this being the richest mining district of Mexico, and therefore of America, will admit of no doubt, and especially in a prospective sense. Already, in anticipation of a railway, many large companies are prospecting their concessions, while the individual miner is also to be found with pickax, pan, and shovel on his back, making for this El Dorado, so old in many ways, and yet so very new.

Mr. H. H. Porter, the prospecting engineer of the Batopilas Mining Company, told me, and showed me the various specimens to verify his statement, that in one little area three hundred yards square, there were found twelve veins of silver running from three dollars to seventy-eight dollars to the ton. The reader unacquainted with mining may understand this by my saying that any silver mine of over twenty dollars to the ton is a fortune to its owner if on or near a railway. There are over five hundred veins in the Batopilas concession of sixty-four square miles, and should any new railway running near by justify further research, it could probably be made five thousand without much trouble.

The history of the big Batopilas Mining Company, about the center of the district I have spoken of, and which stands head and shoulders above all the surrounding mining companies, is a fair example of all in this part of the country where my travels were cast.

Batopilas, or Real de San Pedro de Batopilas, as it was originally named, is said to have been discovered in October, 1632. Like Urique, its discovery is to be ascribed to the "adelantados" sent out shortly after the conquest to explore the country and enlarge the possessions of Spain. It is surmised that the rich mineral finds made near the capital, and which subsequently extended far into the interior, led to the progress of the "adelantados" further north, and inspired the expedition into the Sierra Madres which gave rise to the discovery of Batopilas. Tradition has it that upon their descent to the river bottom the "adelantados" were struck by the luminous appearance of the rocks, which were covered in many parts by snowy flakes of native silver. Hence the name "Nevada," signifying "a fall of snow," which was applied to the first mine worked in the district. The news of the discovery spread far and wide, and, as the evidence of its great richness multiplied, it soon became one of the most famous mines of New Spain. The first miners of the new discovery made a magnificent present to the viceroy, composed entirely of large pieces of native silver, the richness of the ore being unprecedented. I have now in my possession ore from Batopilas that runs from six thousand to eight thousand dollars to the ton, and that looks like a mass of solid silver ten-penny nails imperfectly fused together; so I can readily see how the present of solid native silver could have been made.

In 1790 a royal decree ordered the collection of all data for a history of New Spain, and a special commission of scientists was ordered by the viceroy and Royal Tribunal of Mines to report upon the Batopilas district. There is but one copy of the report extant, which I traced to the city of Chihuahua. The commission states that the silver extracted from Batopilas in a few years amounted to fifty million dollars, not including that which was surreptitiously taken out to escape the heavy imposts levied by the crown, and which must have been enormous. The most famous period of "bonanza" for the Batopilas district was during the last fifty years of the eighteenth and the first years of the present century. During this time the famous mines of Pastrana, El Carmen, Arbitrios, and San Antonio were discovered, and yielded the fabulous returns which have been variously estimated at from sixty million to eighty million dollars. From the outset of the Mexican Revolution in 1810 a period of decay set in, which reduced Batopilas greatly and almost caused its ruin. The many revolutions, together with the wonderful discoveries of very rich gold and silver mining districts adjoining this one, depopulated it to such a degree that it counted but ten resident families in 1845. From this time the reaction which has made Batopilas the richest silver district in the world may be said to date. The old mines were again opened and new ones discovered. The measure of success did not compare with that attained in the time of the Spaniards, however, owing to the lesser energy displayed, but proved amply sufficient to repay the timid efforts of the native speculators.

Not until the year 1862 did American enterprise direct its efforts in so promising a direction. A purchase was effected by an American company, composed principally of gentlemen interested in Wells, Fargo & Co., whereby the property embracing the famous veins of San Antonio and El Carmen passed into their hands. They operated with great success in the face of many difficulties until the year 1879, when the property again changed hands, and was acquired by a stock company, which has held and worked it to the present day. The American companies in this, the richest mining district in the world, are: The Batopilas Mining Company, the Todos Santos Silver Mining Company, and the Santo Domingo Silver Mining Company. The Mexican mining companies are quite numerous, as may be supposed, but I shall not detail them, as it would require too much space. Many of them are very important, as the Urique and Cerro Colorado companies. Altogether there are over a hundred in a greater or less degree of active operation in this rich district, all contained within a radius of four miles. Of these the Batopilas Mining Company owns and operates over sixty. It is without doubt one of the most important American mining ventures in Mexico. It is also a mining company that has had great difficulties to contend with. Its isolation in the establishment of a business of such magnitude in the heart of the Sierra Madres in so short a number of years is an accomplishment suggestive of great energy. This company owns nearly all the famous old mines in this district which, in the times of the Spaniards, yielded those fabulous bonanzas that caused the astonishment of the world. It has had to repair the follies which, from a scientific standpoint, were committed by several generations of inexpert and short-sighted Mexican mine owners. It has had to clear the old mines of immense masses of rock and dirt which had accumulated during many decades of abandonment, "gutting and scalping," as the miners say. Recently over one hundred miles of openings have been made. The most important is the great Porfirio Diaz tunnel, to be 3½ miles in length when completed—one of the longest and most important mining tunnels in the world, cutting over sixty well-known veins at the river's level. No one can look at the great mills, the aqueduct of enormous masonry (eight or nine miles long, and that will take up all the water of the Batopilas river), or the town of Batopilas (a most active place of six thousand people) without respecting the energy that has accomplished all this. The history of Batopilas is only the history of many other mining districts throughout this country, and the fortunes taken from these mines, and those still behind in them, seem unreal and bordering on romance.

There is one mine near the city of Chihuahua, the Santa Eulalia, which in days gone by built the fine cathedral at that place at a cost of eight hundred thousand dollars. This was done by simply paying a tax of about twenty-five cents on every pound of silver mined, which was ample atonement for any or all sins that the owners could commit.

From Batopilas, north or south, the mighty range of mountains lowers in height, while the big barrancas do not cut so deep into their flanks anywhere else as here, giving the finest Alpine scenery to be found in this part of the continent.

Some of the outside facts regarding the mines are really more interesting than the mines themselves. The miners work in the hot interiors bare to the skin, except their sandals and a breechcloth. Even these have to be examined when they emerge from the mine after the work is over. The sandals are taken off and beaten together, while the breechcloth is treated in the same manner if the examiner demands it. Of course the miners are usually known to the examiner, and his searches vary with the supposed honesty of the different workmen. In a mine where pure silver has been known to be cut out with cold chisels by the mule load, and sent direct to the retorts for smelting, the temptation was very great to purloin a little with each departure from the mine; and accounts of the sly efforts of some of the thieves appear more like the yarns in detective stories than cold facts. Ventilating tubes, small as gas pipe and covered with wire gauze, have been used to transfer the metal from the interior to the exterior of the mine for quite long distances. Imitation kits of tools have been made of drills, hammers, etc., all of which were hollow and used for stuffing in stray bits of solid silver. Even candles and candle holders were made hollow and thus used for stealing. I could give a dozen other most singular means employed by these miners in their pilferings.

The tunneling of the old Spaniards was very slow compared with that now done by machinery. In some places there were evidences that they had heated the stones by fire and had then thrown water thereon, shivering the front by sudden chilling, a method yet employed in Honduras and Guatemala, according to an engineer at Batopilas who had recently arrived from those countries.

One of the most singular things connected with prospecting in this particular portion of the mountains is the means by which large deposits of silver near a tunnel can be located. If an iridescent, smoke-like appearance spreads over the rocks at any point of a new tunnel or drift at the end of a week or two, the engineers always drift for it and generally strike silver. This stain is called by them "silver smoke," and is said to be unknown in any other mines. I was given a half dozen theories in regard to it, mostly of a chemical character, but the mere fact that such a strange condition exists to help man pry into nature's secrets is more interesting than any explanation.

From the garden of the hacienda, surrounded by banana and orange groves and all kinds of tropical plants and flowers, one can look up the steep sides of the mountains, which rise abruptly on both sides, to the oaks and pines beyond, and, while sitting on the veranda sipping ices or drinking cool and refreshing drinks, and vigorously using the fan, realize that only a mile above, on the cumbra or crest of the steep mountain, the ice water flows freely in the little mountain streams and the heaviest flannels only would be comfortable.

My stay at Batopilas was somewhat prolonged in waiting for a party that was soon to descend with bullion to Chihuahua. I had originally intended to continue my course toward the Pacific, but the hot weather, more severe in May and June than during July and August, owing to the rainy season tempering the latter, and the fact that I could find a more interesting trip through the Sierra Madres by another trail than that by which I had entered, determined me to turn my face eastward and keep on the high plateau with its grand equable climate. In leaving Batopilas the large pack train carrying the bullion was given two days' start, and we were to ride and join them after they had made the cumbra or crest of the mountains. This trail took me well to the southward of the one traversed on entering the mountains, and gave me a new and interesting country.

On the high mountain crest between Urique and Batopilas I had gained my furthest point west. The Sierra Madres break more abruptly on their westward slopes, and from the crest we could make out the great plains of Sinaloa and Sonora stretching far away toward the Gulf of California. The country to the west in Sonora and Northern Sinaloa is one of the most fertile in Mexico. The valleys of the Fuerte, the Mayo, and the Yaqui are as rich as any river valleys in North America, and perfectly susceptible of sustaining a dense population, or will be when all the Indian troubles of that region are definitely settled. Most of the crops are of the kind, however, that need cheap transportation to compete with less favored districts in the markets of the world, and are now restricted in amount to what is necessary for a mere local consumption. Here wheat yields enormously to the acre, and the fields are so dense that it is next to impossible to wade through them. Cotton grows more luxuriantly than anywhere on the North American continent. Cotton is planted here oftentimes only once in many years, and large fields are seen four, five, and even seven years old, yielding two and three crops annually. In the same field can be seen plants in blossom, pods, and ripe cotton being picked. It will be one of the leading cotton districts of the world when a railway cuts through it so that the producer can have some show to compete with other districts. Corn is very prolific, coffee produces well, tobacco is of fine flavor, and oranges, guavas, bananas, and plantains are plentiful and of rich flavor; but transportation on a pack mule for 100 or 200 miles is too uncertain as to condition of delivery, and too certain as to exorbitant price, to encourage their cultivation beyond local needs of a limited amount. The Fuerte (in Spanish meaning "strong") is a strong-flowing river with enough water—as its name would indicate—to irrigate both sides of its course for nine or ten miles in width. The Mayo is but little inferior, and the Yaqui is even greater.