CHAPTER V.

QUIVIRA.

It is a well-known fact that lost travellers involuntarily walk

circuitously, generally toward the right, and so gradually return to the

place whence they started. This phenomenon is especially frequent in

wide, treeless plains, where prominent objects by which the wanderer can

direct himself are wanting. It has an extremely dangerous effect upon

the mind, and may, if it occurs repeatedly, easily lead to despair and

frenzy. What happens to individuals may also occur to a larger number.

This was the fate of Coronado and his company when they sought and found

Quivira. They returned in a wide bend to their starting-point, after

they had wandered for months on the desolate plains, “led around in a

circle as if by some evil spirit.”

Coronado, having completed all his preparations at Pecos, left that

pueblo in the beginning of May, 1541, to go to the prairies. His general

direction was northeast. On the fourth day he crossed a river that was

so deep that they had to throw a bridge over it. This river was perhaps

the Rio de Mora, and not, as I formerly thought, the little Gallinas,

which flows by Las Vegas. The latter, an affluent of the Pecos, is too

insignificant, while the Mora is tolerably rapid and deeper. But it was

more probably the Canadian River, into which the Mora empties. Of the

three accounts of the campaign which lie before me, Jaramillo’s is very

confused, and that of Pedro de Casteñeda, which was written long after

the event, must be used with scrutiny and caution, while the third

letter of Coronado to Charles V. was composed immediately after the

expedition, and thus records fresh, clear recollections. Coronado and

Casteñeda, besides, agree in the principal points. Herrera has compiled

from all the materials, and has used, among other sources, the anonymous

“_Relacion de los Sucesos de la Jornada_,” etc. (1541). He is not less

trustworthy as a source of information than Mota-Padilla.

The Spaniards soon found themselves in the plains, and were surrounded

by herds of the American bison or buffalo. The first sight of these

animals produced a great terror among the horses. They all ran away at

the view of those large, hairy, ill-shaped beasts, which covered the

plain by thousands, and whose hollow bellowing and glowing eyes still

strangely affect those who see them for the first time. The plain

aroused feelings of anxiety and gloom among the men by its immense

monotony and the absence of any marks by which they could direct

themselves. The conviction stands out in the writings of all the

witnesses, that an oppressive feeling of helplessness soon made itself

master of them. Casteñeda gives an excellent description of the llanos

and their character: “All that one could see of these plains was

entirely uninhabited. On a stretch of two hundred and fifty leagues one

could discern neither the other mountain chains, nor hills, nor a

single elevation of more than two or three fathoms. Occasional lagoons

were found, as round as plates, which might have been a stone’s-throw in

diameter, while a few were a little broader. The water of some was

fresh, of others salt. The grass grows high around these pools, but

everywhere else it is extremely short. Trees stand only in isolated

ravines, in the bottoms of which flow little brooks, so that one can see

around him nothing but sky and plain, for he is not aware of these

ravines till he gets to their edge. Descending them are paths, which the

buffaloes have trodden in going to drink.”

The feeling of helplessness which gradually crept upon the hearts of the

Spaniards became critical by the growing conviction that their leader,

“the Turk,” was betraying them and purposely leading them astray. They

began to believe that the inhabitants of the pueblos had induced him to

conduct the Spaniards into the plains, in order that they might perish

there and the sedentary tribes thus be rid of their troublesome guests.

His companion, whom the Pecos Indians had associated with him, who was

born at Quivira, and whom the chronicler calls variously “Sopete” and

“Ysopete,” talked quite differently from “the Turk.” The feeling thus

came upon the Spaniards, at the very beginning of the campaign, that the

outcome of their enterprise was at least extremely doubtful.

The troop came upon the first Indians of the plains about seventeen days

after leaving Pecos. Coronado pertinently designates these people as

those “who go around the country with the cows.” The Prairie Indian,

who lives on the bison, also, as it were, lives with him. These

aborigines dwelt in tents of buffalo hide; they had no agriculture; they

dressed in buffalo skins, and kept dogs, which they used as beasts of

burden. The Spanish writers call them Querechos. There is no doubt that

they were Apaches, and of the group which were called Vaqueros in the

beginning of the sixteenth century, because they were associated

exclusively with the “wild cow” (or bison). This tribe used the dog as a

pack and draft animal as late as the middle of the last century. The

species apparently belongs to the family of the Arctic dog, and probably

came down with the Apaches from the north. I do not know whence the name

of “Querechos” is derived, unless it is a pueblo name from the Jemez

dialect, which was spoken in Pecos. It has some resemblance to

“Oi-ra-uash,” by which the Queres Indians designated a savage tribe that

threatened the pueblos from the plains previous to the arrival of the

Spaniards.

The Querechos, or Apaches, as I shall hereafter call them, were friendly

toward the Spaniards; but they knew nothing of Quivira and its

treasures. The whites then continued to follow their guides, but these

soon lost their way; every landmark disappeared, and thirst began to

afflict the adventurers, who wandered aimlessly over the plains.

Reconnoissances led to no results, for the sky and bisons were all that

could be discovered. The Spaniards had accustomed their horses to

hunting the wild oxen, and inflicted the same useless slaughter upon

them of which American and European hunters and travellers were guilty,

till the animals disappeared from their haunts. At one of the camping

places the troop were surprised by a violent storm, with hail, that

frightened the horses, wounded many, and broke to pieces everything

frangible in the camp. A whirlwind accompanied the hail, and carried

away tents, coverings, and some of the horses. The storm fortunately

came upon them in the bottom of a ravine; if it had been on the plain

the damage would have been much greater.

Wandering around in this way upon the illimitable plains, they again

came suddenly in contact with Indians. Like the Querechos, this tribe,

which was called “Teyas,” lived exclusively with and upon the buffalo.

They were hostile toward the Apaches of the plain, had been troublesome

to the pueblo of Pecos, and appeared frank and friendly toward the

Spaniards. They were of large stature and well shaped, and painted their

faces and bodies with various figures. I do not venture to express a

definite opinion as to what tribe the Teyas belonged to. Some have

thought they were the Comanches, but those Indians were not known to the

Pueblos till about the year 1700, while the Teyas, as I have remarked,

had had hostile (and also friendly) intercourse with them before the

arrival of the Spaniards. They may have been Utes. They knew of Quivira

and the eastern regions, and gave Coronado information concerning them.

But they were ignorant of the stone buildings, of the treasures and

wealth, and in general of all that “the Turk” had described. The

dwellings in Quivira, they said, were of “straw and skins,” and there

was very little maize there. These accounts produced great depression,

but still greater was the irritation against the guide who had drawn

them into this country. “The Turk” finally confessed that he had spoken

falsely to the whites when he told them of stone houses; but he adhered

to what he had asserted concerning the numerous population and the

wealth in metals of Quivira. He was thereupon put in chains, and the

company continued its arduous march with guides whom the Teyas supplied.

Scarcity of water was the greatest privation they suffered. Intense

thirst afflicted man and beast, and buffalo meat was all they had with

which to appease their hunger, for the supplies of maize were exhausted.

The Teyas advised Coronado to return; they assured him that nearly forty

days’ march would still be required to reach Quivira, and that the

scarcity of water and of vegetable food would destroy his little army on

the way. Many soldiers had already disappeared by going from the camp to

hunt, when they became lost and miserably perished. Nevertheless

Coronado determined to satisfy at least himself personally with the

sight of Quivira, but to risk the lives of only a few men on the chance.

Against the entreaties and expostulations of his followers, he selected

twenty-nine horsemen, put himself at their head, entrusted the command

of the main corps to Tristan de Arellano, and went on under the guidance

of the Teyas, together with the enchained “Turk” and the other Indian.

According to Casteñeda’s statements, the point where the Spaniards

separated was thirty-seven days’ march--of six or seven leagues or

between sixteen and nineteen English miles each--from Pecos. If we

suppose, what is, however, doubtful, because of their wandering around,

that they marched toward the northeast, they were then near the eastern

border of New Mexico, close upon what is now the Indian Territory. A

passage in Coronado’s report says that in thirty-seven days they only

marched on twenty, so that the distance traversed would be about three

hundred miles. It, however, appears very plainly that they had turned to

the right and marched in a circle, and, instead of northeast, were east

or east-southeast of Pecos.

The date of the separation can be fixed approximately. The Spaniards

left Pecos on the 3d of May, and, according to Casteñeda, reached the

place where the army remained on June 9th. On St. Peter and St. Paul’s

day--July 10th--according to Jaramillo, the little band of horsemen to

which he belonged, and which was under Coronado’s personal leading, had

been thirty days on the march; the separation must therefore have taken

place on the 9th of June--that is, on Ascension Day of 1541, as

Mota-Padilla correctly gives it. The “army,” as it was called, was now

divided into two parts, and it is therefore necessary to follow the

fortunes of each of them separately. Casteñeda belonged to the chief

corps, and concerned himself, in his account, exclusively with it.

Coronado and Jaramillo, on the other hand, speak only of the march to

Quivira, in which they took part.

Arellano and the “army” proper remained fifteen days in the spot where

Coronado left them, spending the time in slaughtering the buffaloes

that ranged around them. This wasteful butchery was carried to such an

extent that more than five hundred bulls were slain, with a number of

cows. Several of the soldiers were lost in the hunt, and disappeared

entirely. At last, on the 24th of June, a retreat was begun, in the

course of which several salt lakes and numerous prairie-dogs were seen.

More than thirty leagues (eighty-one miles) south of the spot where the

bridge had been thrown across the Canadian River the band came to the

Pecos, below “Anton Chico”; then followed the course of that river to

the great pueblo, arriving in front of it on July 19th. The inhabitants

had changed in feeling, and refused them provisions. So the weary

company were obliged to go on, and came to a halt at Tiguex, near the

present town of Bernalillo, in their former headquarters, at the end of

July, 1541. The Tiguas had in the interval resumed possession of their

pueblo, but left it on the approach of the Spaniards and fled to the

mountains. It was still summer, and there was no lack of provisions.

Arellano therefore busied himself actively with laying in stores for the

winter.

So far as the main body of the Spanish “army” was concerned, the march

toward Quivira had terminated, having borne only insignificant fruits.

Except for the buffalo hunting, which supplied meat and hides in

quantities, they had gained nothing in return for their unprecedented

toil and danger besides the conviction that they had been betrayed and

misled, and that Quivira was in no sense the gold-rich land that it had

been described to them to be. This conviction had been impressed upon

every one of them, so that the men were unwilling to see Coronado start

off on an adventure more hazardous than any they had passed through, and

with only a few horsemen. They were truly devoted to their leader, and

were reluctant to part from him; yet, although many took leave of him

with a fixed impression that they would never see him again, they obeyed

his orders; for his enterprise might ultimately lead to discoveries that

would recompense them for all their sufferings in the past and the

present.

They therefore readily disposed themselves to the commands of Arellano,

who, starting from Tiguex, instituted further researches along the

course of the Rio Grande. Francisco de Barrionuevo, with two soldiers,

followed the stream toward the north. Passing through the country on the

west side, he came to the group of the “Hernes.” These are the pueblos

of which numerous ruins lie in the neighborhood of the present Jemez.

They are divided into two groups, numbering together ten villages, seven

of which belong properly to Jemez, and three to the subdivision of Aguas

Calientes (the present “Thermen”). The Jemez Indians entered at once

into friendly relations with the Spaniards, and continued thus till

1680. Touching upon the Queres on the west, they were wedged in between

them and the powerful hostile tribe of the Navajos. These were so

troublesome to them that even the two churches which were built for them

soon after the year 1600 were temporarily given up and the Jemez Indians

were dispersed. About the year 1622 the Franciscan missionaries

collected them again, and gradually united them into a single large

village. This village, abandoned in 1680, is now merged in the pueblo of

Jemez, which contains in all about four hundred souls.

Returning from Jemez to the Rio Grande, Barrionuevo seems to have

followed the right (or western) shore of the river exclusively, for he

mentions the pueblo of “Yuque Yunque,” “the inhabitants of which, as

well as those of another village situated on the river, fled to the

mountains,” where they had four other fortified villages. The place was

inaccessible to horses. “Yuque Yunque” is the present deserted

“Yuge-uinge” (village of the ravine), called briefly “Yunque.” The town

of Chamita on the Denver & Rio Grande Railroad stands on its ruins, and

near by was built, in 1598, the first Spanish settlement in New Mexico,

San Gabriel.[87] On the east bank is the pueblo of San Juan, in a

charming situation, and the valley, which borders the course of the Rio

Grande, although hardly twelve miles long, is the most fruitful and the

loveliest in New Mexico, that of Taos, perhaps, excepted. The massive

chain of the Sierra Madre overlooks it in the east, with peaks that rise

to a height of 13,000 feet; in the west a gloomy front of volcanic

mesas, intersected by awful clefts, projects close upon the river-bank;

and behind them the mountains of Abiquin and the Sierra del Valle crown

the landscape. This beautiful region was, and still is, occupied by the

Tehuas Indians. There yet stand two other of their pueblos, San

Ildefonso (“Poo-joge”) and Santa Clara (“Ka-Poo”), on the bank, which

have existed since 1598. If Barrionuevo, as I suppose, went from

Cochiti through the great cañon which the Rio Grande traverses between

there and San Ildefonso, or on the east side of the river over the mesa

of Toma and the “Cuervo,” as it is called, to Chamita, he would have

observed both these pueblos if they existed then. This, however, he

seems not to have done, and the four villages situated on the mountain

were, therefore, on the west side, “Tzirege” and “Triape,” in a wild

region difficult of access; and on the east side two pueblos in the

neighborhood of “Nambé.” The accuracy of the accounts of the Spanish

writers often astonishes those who have become acquainted by long

residence with the country they describe, and creates a feeling of high

respect for them.

Barrionuevo pressed still farther toward the north. Twenty leagues, or

fifty-four miles, beyond Chamita he came to a large pueblo called

“Braba,” which was built on both sides of a river, and contained very

large estufas. General Simpson has identified this place with the

present Taos, and I see no reason for not agreeing with him. The native

name for Taos is indeed “Tegat-hâ,” and I have never been able to find

any name of a place in any of the pueblo languages that corresponds with

“Braba” or “Uraba,” or “Yuraba.” Yet the situation and the whole

description point to Taos as the place that is meant. Casteñeda says

further on that Braba was the last village to the north that was built

of stone and mortar, and that is actually the case with Taos.

Thus the Spaniards had found and specified, before the end of the summer

of 1541, all the linguistic stocks of the pueblos of New Mexico, and had

come in actual contact with all the groups of New Mexican aborigines,

except the Jumanos and a few roaming hordes in the southwest, which once

belonged to the Texan group. It is even possible that the Jumanos might

be found among the painted Tejas, who were afterward called by the

Spaniards, from their painting, _Indios rayados_, or striped Indians.

This great tribe, which was extinguished in the insurrection of 1680,

then inhabited the regions of eastern and southeastern New Mexico and

northern Chihuahua. The Jumanos of New Mexico were in a state of

constant feud with the Apaches, and this became the cause of their

disappearance.

September was drawing toward its end, and the commander-in-chief had not

yet returned from his hazardous journey to Quivira. The time which he

had fixed for his return had passed, and Tristan de Arellano was anxious

concerning the fate of the _Adelantado_. Leaving Barrionuevo in command

at Tiguex, he went with forty horsemen to Pecos. The people there were

still hostile, and he was obliged to bring his small artillery against

their pueblo. The great houses resisted the attack, and he could not

force an entrance. He was therefore encamped outside of the village in

the valley, when the news came to him that the _Adelantado_ was

approaching with his company; and a few days afterward Coronado arrived,

sound and in good health, but weary, empty-handed, and disappointed. He

had found Quivira and explored it well, but discovered no signs there of

a permanent settlement, or of gold or silver.

The Tejas Indians had informed the Spaniards, while the whole army was

still together, that they had gone much too far south; Quivira was away

in the north. When, therefore, Coronado started with his twenty-nine

men, the Tejas led him directly north, for thirty days, through

unlimited, treeless plains, covered with herds of buffaloes and

traversed by small streams, till on August 9th they came to a river,

which they named, in honor of the saints of the day, “Rio San Pedro y

San Pablo.” Jaramillo says that they had been able to march over only

short distances each day, so that this river can have been no other than

the Arkansas, and the spot where they struck it was probably near the

Great Bend, for after crossing the river they followed its northern bank

for three days toward the northeast, a direction corresponding exactly

with the course of the Arkansas in that latitude.

It may be remarked, by the way, that Coronado speaks of this region as

situated in the 40th degree of north latitude; that is, that it was five

and a half degrees north of the Gila, according to the determinations of

that time. The Gila River, however, runs, not in the parallel of 34°

30´, but of about 33°, while the Arkansas flows in the 38th degree, or

five and a half degrees north of the Gila. Quivira should therefore be

sought in the present State of Kansas, and in the central districts,

about a hundred miles north of the Arkansas River.

It would be useless, however, to look for the ruins of a considerable

permanent settlement of the natives. There is no such place, and the

tribe that lived at Quivira was a roaming Indian horde that subsisted

chiefly by hunting the buffalo, and casually followed a rude

agriculture. Coronado says: “I had been told that the houses were made

of stone and were several storied; they are only of straw, and the

inhabitants are as savage as any that I have seen. They have no clothes,

nor cotton to make them out of; they simply tan the hides of the cows

which they hunt, and which pasture around their village and in the

neighborhood of a large river. They eat their meat raw, like the

Querechos and the Tejas, and are enemies to one another and war among

one another. All these men look alike. The inhabitants of Quivira are

the best of hunters, and they plant maize.” There were no signs of gold

or silver; some iron pyrites and a few pieces of copper were all the

metal that was found. Jaramillo confirms these statements, adds that the

huts were round, and clearly describes one of the medicine lodges that

are common among the Indians of the prairies.

Coronado, with his company and “the Turk,” arrived at Quivira on August

21st. “The Turk” was brought in chains, a prisoner, while the other

Indian was able to prove that he had at least always told the truth.

Through him the Spaniards had been well received at Quivira, and that

embittered them all the more against the “the Turk.” He confessed that

the Pueblo Indians had engaged him to draw the Spaniards into the

plains, in order that they might perish there. Implicit faith must not,

however, be given to this assertion. When the prisoner could not deliver

himself by such confessions and other pretences, he tried to stir up the

people of Quivira against the Spaniards. The plan was quickly

discovered, and the treacherous guide was hanged the same night.

Coronado stayed twenty-five days with the Indians of Quivira and the

vicinity. He found the country fertile. “The soil,” he says, “is the

best that can be found for all the crops of Spain; besides being strong

and black, it is well watered with brooks, springs, and rivers. I found

plums like those in Spain, nuts, very fine grapes, and mulberries.” To

this description is added the testimony of Jaramillo, who praises the

fertility of the soil, the abundance of water, and the absence of

mountains, and gives special prominence to certain productions, such as

flax, sumach, and grapes.

Notwithstanding all these advantages, which Coronado sufficiently

pointed out, he could not remain in Quivira. Winter, if not immediately

at his door, was not very far off, and the Spaniards, surprised by early

frosts, and not being acquainted with the delightful autumn of Kansas

and the Mississippi Valley, thought that cold weather would follow at

once. They therefore began a retreat, accomplished it without accident

in forty days, and arrived in the Pecos Valley on October 25th (1541).

Thence Coronado returned with Arellano to Bernalillo, where he wrote on

October 31st the report to Charles V., from which part of the facts we

have related are taken.

It is remarkable that when Coronado told his men the full truth about

Quivira, and confided to them the discouraging results of his

expedition, they became all the more fixed in the idea that Quivira was

a gold-rich country. They conceived that their commander had not gone

far enough into the interior because, meeting a dense population, he

was not willing to venture among them with his small following. Indians

who had been with Arellano confirmed the Spaniards in these opinions,

and promoted an inclination which was liable to lead on the one side to

further expeditions, and on the other side to a breach with their

leader. He found himself in a very difficult position. He was at all

events convinced that another expedition beyond Quivira would not be

likely to lead to the discovery of what they were seeking for, while it

would be attended with great danger; for the whole army would have to

follow him, and he would therefore be cutting himself entirely off from

New Mexico and going out into the unknown without any base of

operations. He felt, on the other hand, that such a campaign, if not of

gold and silver, might lead to other important discoveries. He was sure

that the great river which the Spaniards then called “Rio del Espiritú

Santo,” and which was nothing else than the Mississippi, must rise in

those unknown regions. To reach this river from the west would be a

great achievement, which would cover him and his men with honor, and be

of much direct or indirect advantage to them. At the same time, his men

were insisting so earnestly upon an attempt in that direction, that

Coronado determined to yield to them, and, spending the winter in the

valley of the Rio Grande, to leave New Mexico in the spring of 1542 and

go eastward once more. Quivira, which had now been proved and

acknowledged to be poor in metals, was no longer the sole object of the

contemplated new expedition; it was to form the new base of operations,

from which the step into the unknown should be made.

I have shown that Quivira was in central Kansas, in the region of Great

Bend and Newton, and a little north of there. It is also clear that the

name appertained to a roving Indian tribe, and not to a geographical

district. Hence, when I say that Coronado’s Quivira was there, the

identification is good for the year 1541, and not for a later time. The

tribe wandered with the bison, and with the tribe the name also went

hither and thither. In the place where Coronado found Quivira, he was

not more than seven hundred miles from the Mississippi. It is a

remarkable fact that in the same year, and at nearly the same time, June

18, 1541, Hernando de Soto reached the Mississippi from the southeast

and crossed it to the west. Had Coronado gone directly east or southeast

from the point where he and his horsemen separated from the chief corps

to go in search of Quivira, instead of in a northerly direction, he

might have shaken hands with the discoverer of the Mississippi on the

western shore of the great river.

On Coronado’s return friendly relations were restored with the Indians

of Pecos, and even the Tiguas at Bernalillo showed a disposition to

inhabit their deserted villages again. Before the end of the year 1541

(not 1542, as Casteñeda says), in October, Pedro de Tobar arrived with

reinforcements. The letters which he brought from Spain and Mexico

caused Garcia Lopez de Cárdenas to leave the expedition and return home

by way of Zuñi and Sonora. I mention this fact among others because it

shows with what security a solitary Spaniard could then make the long

journey, which is not wholly without dangers to-day, with only Indian

guides. This security has been ascribed to the respect which the Spanish

arms won from the tribes, and to intimidation caused by severe

treatment. The explanation is not sufficient in the present case. The

Pueblo Indian, or the Apache, or the Navajo would not have been afraid

of individual Spaniards if he had been generally inclined to hostility.

The relation between the Indians and the Spaniards was, on the contrary,

a friendly one, to which only the excesses against the Tiguas formed a

solitary and therefore a conspicuous exception. With all the other

tribes (except the little frictions with the Pecos, which always

smoothed themselves away) the Spaniards lived in peace, and the roads

from and toward Sonora were more open and secure than they are now.

Large tracts were uninhabited, it is true, in which at least a few human

abodes may now be seen, and the savage Indians were much more widely

dispersed than they are now; but the present increased population, with

increased quiet, also furnishes occasions of greater peril to property

and life.

Coronado was beloved by his men. He took the largest share in all their

privations, and whenever there was an allotment of provisions and

clothing, he was careful to protect the common soldiers against the

greed of the officers. Such a division took place in the fall of 1541,

but Coronado was not in a condition to exercise his accustomed

authority. The bonds of discipline had become relaxed, and his own

energy had been weakened. Undeceived concerning the value of his

conquests, he perceived that they opened no future to him, and still

less to his wife, whom he had left in Mexico. He longed to go back to

this wife, without whom there was no home for him, and he could not give

her a home in New Mexico. It was, therefore, not contrary to his secret

wishes, as he remarked, that the soldiers began of themselves to object

to the contemplated expedition and to talk of a return to Mexico.

Nevertheless, he continued making his arrangements, and the winter of

1541-42 was quietly spent in the camp at Bernalillo in busy preparation.

They were to start in the spring of 1542, and the time for breaking camp

was approaching, when two events caused a change in their plans. As

Coronado was one day tilting with Don Pedro Maldonado, while on the full

run the girth of his saddle broke, and he fell upon the side of

Maldonado’s horse, which, being also at full speed, sprang over him, and

inflicted a dangerous wound upon his head.

After long suffering he had begun to recover, when Garcia Lopez de

Cárdenas unexpectedly returned from Sonora, bringing important news. He

had gone to the Valley of Sonora without delay, and confidently hoped to

meet the little colony in Suya. Instead of that he found the settlement

a pile of smoking ruins, and the natives in full insurrection. After the

death of Melchior Diaz, Diego de Alcaráz had continued in command at

Suya. His character, which he had already revealed in Sinaloa, was not

such as to qualify him for forming friendly relations with the Indians,

while his subordinates were of the most unruly soldiers of the

government of New Galicia. Their outrageous conduct excited the Indians

to resistance. Some of the Spaniards fled to Culiacan; the rest, with a

few exceptions, besides Alcaráz, were murdered in the night, their

horses killed, all their cattle slaughtered or carried off, and their

houses torn down and burnt. Cárdenas, in order to escape the poisoned

arrows of the Opatas, hurried back to Zuñi, and thence to the Rio

Grande.

This report provoked a relapse in Coronado’s condition, which caused all

thoughts of Quivira to be set aside for the time. How long his illness

and convalescence lasted cannot be exactly determined. An error in

counting the years has crept into Casteñeda’s story, for he places the

beginning of the expedition to the plains in 1541 and the return in

1542, but afterward corrects himself as to the date 1542, so as to fix

the return to Mexico in the year 1543. This is certainly an error,

unless Coronado’s illness lasted a whole year and the Spaniards spent

the winter of 1542-43 in Bernalillo. It appears clearly from the

reports, however, that this was not the case, but that Coronado had

fully recovered in March, 1542. The relapse which he suffered is

suspected by Casteñeda of having been a pretence; but Jaramillo, who was

an officer, and stood in closer relations with him than Casteñeda, says

nothing of this. His wounded condition increased the weary commander’s

longing to return, and the insurrection of the Opatas in the rear of the

little army made its situation very critical. He therefore proposed to

his officers to take advantage of the feeling of the troops, and to have

them prepare a petition to him for the evacuation of New Mexico.

Signatures were easily procured for this petition, but Coronado had

hardly begun the preparations for a retreat on the strength of it, when

several of the signers asked to have their names withdrawn. It was,

however, too late, and most of the soldiers adhered to their former

decision. Casteñeda, whose morose nature dwells upon this division, says

that Coronado had lost all authority and affection among the officers,

who obeyed him after this, not out of respect, but only because of their

oaths. Great discord prevailed in the little army; some wanted to stay

at any cost; but they all agreed at last, and in the beginning of April,

1542, Tiguex was evacuated and the retreat to Zuñi begun.

Over a few members of the expedition Coronado had no power. These were

the priests, who had come with him to this point; the Franciscan monks,

Fray Juan de Padilla, Fray Juan de la Cruz, and the lay brother, Fray

Luis de Ubeda, decided to remain in New Mexico, even without the

protection of the army. It was indifferent to them whether there were

treasures in the newly discovered regions or not; they thought only of

the souls of the natives, and considered themselves pledged to devote

their lives to the work of conversion. Coronado could not compel them to

return with him, and they equally could not demand a large guard. Only

volunteers, therefore, remained with them in Bernalillo. These were a

Portuguese, Andrés del Campo; a mestizo; two Indians named Lúcas and

Sebastian, who had been adopted by the monks in Michoacan; two Indians

from Oaxaca; and a negro. They stayed voluntarily, as we have said,

although there could hardly be a doubt as to what their fate would be.

Such heroic devotion finds favor even in Casteñeda’s cynic judgment, for

he says of Fray Juan de Padilla that “we must believe that his zeal was

true and sincere.”

After the “army” left the Valley of the Rio Grande the three priests

apportioned the field of labor which they had chosen. Fray Juan de la

Cruz remained among the Tiguas at Bernalillo, where he passed out of

view. A story that he was murdered is little questioned in the church,

and is very probably true. The other two priests went to Pecos, where

Fray Luis de Ubeda settled, and likewise passed out of definite

knowledge. The natives were, however, at least in the beginning,

friendly in their demeanor toward him.

Fray Juan de Padilla, in his turn, chose Quivira as his field of work.

Accompanied by the others who remained behind, and by guides from Pecos,

he reached the tribe during the summer months of the same year. The

wooden cross was still standing which Coronado had erected, with the

words cut upon it: “Francisco Vasquez de Coronado, leader of a campaign,

came to this place.” This cross served him as the central point for

missionary work, and the Quiviras received him gladly. Yet,

notwithstanding the warnings of the people around him, he wanted to go

farther. His first effort to travel toward the east brought him in

contact with a hostile horde, which Casteñeda calls “the Guyas.” The

priest immediately perceived his danger, and ordered the Portuguese and

his other companions to flee and leave him alone. Resistance was

impossible, and it would be better to save their lives than sacrifice

them uselessly. The advice was prudent and worthy of the devotion of the

priest. His companions therefore left him, with bitter sorrow in their

hearts, and saw him kneel to await the coming of the savages. There is

no doubt that he was immediately killed.[88] It is thus not improbable

that the first martyr of the church, in the Spanish attempts to settle

in the southwest, fell in Kansas, not more than six hundred miles west

of the Mississippi, and only fifty years after the landing of Columbus.

The story of this event could hardly reach posterity without including

an adventure of great hazard and of the most marvellous character. The

companions of Fray Juan de Padilla fled back to the Quiviras, and it is

said that those savages received the not unanticipated news of the death

of the priest with sincere mourning and deep grief. Neither the

Portuguese nor the Indians who had accompanied him felt themselves

longer called upon to continue the missionary work, but were anxious to

return to Mexico. Yet they were disposed not to go back by the same

route as they had come, but to see new regions. It was in the spirit of

the time. Fearlessness and the constant expectation of finding something

new and astonishing were so deeply implanted in those men that it was

like a second nature to them to go recklessly forward into the unknown

rather than back into the known. Then, perhaps, a return to New Mexico

might be more dangerous than an advance in the opposite direction. The

Portuguese and the two Indians from Michoacan, who, as adopted children

(“donados”) of the order of St. Francis, wore the Franciscan dress,

directed their course from Kansas toward the east and then toward the

south. The fact is undoubted that they finally reached Pánuco (in the

present State of Tamaulipas in the Mexican republic), after a journey

comparable in its adventurous character with that of Cabeza de Vaca and

his companions. I have not been able to fix the exact date, for the

event, although verified in many ways, seems not to have attracted much

attention. The fugitives did not see the Mississippi, but passed on the

western side of the river, through the Indian Territory and perhaps a

part of Texas, to Tamaulipas, whence the Portuguese went to the City of

Mexico, and the two Indians, Lúcas and Sebastian, to their home in

Michoacan, where Sebastian died a few days after his arrival. The

details of this remarkable wandering are unfortunately very scanty. It

is inferred, from the fact that Gomára mentions it, that it took place

before the year 1550.

The main corps under Coronado had returned to Mexico. While the

expedition had suffered in the beginning from the disadvantages

occasioned by intense eagerness and haste to reach its object, the

retreat afforded a spectacle of sad disappointment, discontent, and

consequent insubordination. Between the Rio Grande and Zuñi disease

broke out among the horses, under which more than thirty perished. It

was, perhaps, the same disease which now prevails occasionally among

horses in New Mexico, and is called _el mal_. The Spaniards rested in

Zuñi, and some of the Mexican Indians remained there--a fact which

should be carefully regarded in the investigation of the myths and

usages of the natives. Although the people were friendly, they followed

the troop for several days, and tried to compel some of the men to stay.

The troop reached Chichiltic-calli without delay, and were met there by

Juan Gallegas, who had come from Mexico with reinforcements and

ammunition. He was very angry at finding the army on the retreat. The

fabulous reports which, reinforced by the representations of “the Turk,”

had reached Mexico had produced a revival of speculative excitement

respecting New Mexico, and the newly arrived soldiers were greatly

dissatisfied. Some of the officers made use of this feeling to urge at

least that a permanent settlement should be founded, but Coronado’s

soldiers opposed this, and insisted on continuing the retreat. Coronado

himself pleaded illness, and seemed to have lost all his energy.

The troop therefore moved again, to make their way into Sonora. The

Opatas opposed them, annoying the march daily, and killing men and

horses with poisoned arrows. No pause occurred in the hostilities till

Batuco was reached; thence the despondent company proceeded unhindered

to Culiacan, and there all the bonds of discipline were broken. Coronado

started from Culiacan for Mexico on the 4th of July, 1542. When he

arrived at the capital he was followed by hardly a hundred soldiers.

The rest had scattered to the right and left on the way.

As the entrance into the capital was gloomy, so was his reception by the

viceroy, Don Antonio de Mendoza, a hard blow for Coronado, from which he

never recovered. This officer, the highest in authority in Mexico,

declared to his former favorite that he was disappointed and angry that

he had given up the north, and in such terms that Coronado withdrew to

the present Cuernavaca, where he needed to give himself no more concern

about his province of New Galicia, and died there in retirement. In the

year 1548 the government was compelled, on account of his entire

incapacity for business, to appoint a court of _audiencia_ for the

“kingdom of New Galicia.” Little is known concerning the proceedings

that were instituted against him. The once honored, now despised

nobleman was deserted in early old age, and died neglected.

Was the disfavor into which he had fallen, and which cast a gloomy

shadow over the whole of his after-life, deserved? As a leader Coronado

was always worthy of distinction; he never spared himself, but always

had a fatherly care for his subordinates; and if we regard the whole

course of the campaign, we must acknowledge that he always acted

prudently and yet decisively. Two dark features are visible in his

intercourse with the natives: the abduction of the chiefs of Pecos, and

the cruelties against the Tiguas at Bernalillo. In the former case

Coronado followed an example which stood prominent at the time in the

view of every Spaniard, and of many a champion in the rest of

Europe--that of Hernando Cortés; and he afterward repaired his fault.

The responsibility for the atrocious cruelties at Tiguex does not fall

so much upon him as upon Garcia Lopez de Cárdenas. A proof that he did

not, as a rule, behave badly toward the Indians is afforded by the fact

that during the whole course of the expedition, which lasted two years

and extended over so wide a territory, and in which so many different

tribes were encountered, only four cases of real hostilities occurred,

and only one of these was of great importance.

The conception which has been often formed of Coronado as a wicked

adventurer is therefore unjust. Equally wrong and unfounded are the

accusations which Mendoza formulated against him, and on the ground of

which he treated the knight so severely. The following are assigned as

the reasons by which the action of the viceroy was determined: first,

while Alarcon wrote with the fullest detail in his reports, the letters

of Coronado were short, and therefore unsatisfactory; second, Coronado

wrote also directly to the emperor and king (Charles V.), which the

viceroy considered a presumption on his part, and even regarded as

bordering on treason; third, his evacuation of New Mexico and return

seemed at least a gross violation of duty, for it was ascribed to

disobedience, incapacity, and cowardice.

The letters of Coronado (of which I am acquainted only with those

written to the emperor) are, indeed, not to be compared with the

detailed daybook-like reports of Alarcon. But the latter, being most of

the time on shipboard, had leisure and opportunity to prepare even more

voluminous reports than he really made. It is not strange that he

expanded his accounts. Coronado, on the other hand, was living under

conditions which often made writing impossible, as I have many times

experienced. No one is disposed to write long letters in the pueblo

houses; moreover, in winter and on the road to Quivira the ink may have

failed. Don Antonio de Mendoza understood none of these conditions, and

did not realize the great difference between the situations of the

seaman and of the officer in the heart of the continent. With all the

traits for which he was distinguished, the viceroy was first of all

things a European officer, who, however ably he could direct from his

desk, had no comprehension of American camp-life. Coronado’s letters to

the emperor and king were, it is true, an imprudence on his part that

bordered on insubordination, and (in view of the previous difficulties

of Cortés with Diego Velasquez) might easily have aroused suspicion in

the viceroy.

Respecting the evacuation of New Mexico, I have minutely examined the

course of events, in order to make a judgment upon it possible. There

was no cowardice. Coronado’s wounds, and the result of the expedition to

Quivira, with homesickness and a weakened bodily condition, probably

contributed much to a discouragement which was based on the conviction

that the country was not worth the effort which its control would cost.

Coronado accused his predecessor, Fray Marcos, the discoverer of New

Mexico, unjustly, as I have already shown, of having published

exaggerated accounts of that country. He did not anticipate, he could

not anticipate, that his own accounts, which fully agreed, so far as

they concerned the same regions, with those of the monk, might afford

occasion, to a superficial review, for the same reproaches against him

as he made against the Franciscan, and supply material for distortions

and mistakes the practical results of which would be as evil in the

nineteenth century as were those of the exaggerated accounts of Cibola

in the sixteenth century.

* * * * *

With the return to Mexico of the little army that Coronado commanded,

the name of Cibola lost its fascination. The legend of the Amazons had,

in the north, passed into that of the “seven cities,” and these are

accounted for by the seven pueblos or villages of Zuñi. But Quivira

continued to exercise an unperceived influence on the imaginations of

men. Notwithstanding, or perhaps because, Coronado had told the

unadorned truth concerning the situation and conditions of the place,

the world presumed that he was mistaken, and insisted on continuing the

search for it. And although Juan de Oñate, in 1599, and Saldivar, in

1618, went out in the direction which Coronado had designated, and found

only what he had found, yet was Quivira more persistently sought, and at

a greater distance; and it became a phantom, like the Dorado, which

hovered with visions of golden treasures before the fancies of the

Spaniards, in the northeast and east of New Mexico. It was forgotten

that the Quiviras were a wandering horde of Prairie Indians, who lived

with the herds of bison, and not a sedentary people; that the mission of

Jumanos, which Fray Francisco Letrado had founded, was visited by

Quiviras, and the church there was the religious centre for all these

wandering tribes after 1636; and that the Quiviras were then roaming

around for a distance of forty leagues, or one hundred and eight miles,

eastward, or in southeastern New Mexico, and that, therefore, they had

moved southward. The insurrection of 1680 produced such a confusion in

the ethnographic conditions of New Mexico that Quivira passed out of

mind, and when the revolution extended to Chihuahua and Sonora in 1684,

the only thought was of self-preservation. After the re-conquest of New

Mexico by Diego de Vargas (1692 to 1694) followed the irruption of the

Comanches from the north, greatly disturbing the former ethnographic

conditions, in the east and down into Texas. The Jumanos had already

vanished, and even the name of the Quiviras, if it was a real name, was

lost; but not the recollection of the golden stories which had been

associated with them. A golden kingdom had grown in imagination out of

the tribe, and to this golden kingdom belonged, as did the city of Manoa

to the South American Dorado, a great capital in New Mexico, called _la

gran Quivira_. This treasure-city had lain in ruins since the

insurrection of 1680; but its treasures were supposed to be buried in

the neighborhood, for it was said there had once been a wealthy mission

there, and the priests had buried and hidden the vessels of the church.

Thus the Indian kingdom of Quivira of “the Turk” was metamorphosed in

the course of two centuries into an opulent Indian mission, and its

vessels of gold and silver into a church service. But where Quivira

should be looked for was forgotten.

In the middle of the last century a Spanish captain of engineers, Don

Bernardo de Mier y Pacheco, went upon a scientific and political mission

for the Crown in New Mexico. He explored the ruins of the country, and

the numerous pueblos of the Cañon de Chaca (in the present home of the

Navajos) excited his interest in the highest degree. When he began to

concern himself about the situation of Quivira, it was supposed that he

had plans and documentary evidences to assist him in finding the place.

The measurements which he made in the ruins of the Chaca convinced the

people that Quivira was there, and this conviction grew and spread

rapidly. There was living at that time in Socorro on the Rio Grande an

old Indian who was called “Tio Juan Largo.” When he heard of the search

of the Spanish officer, he protested at once against the idea that

Quivira could be found in the northwest, and insisted that the ruins of

the former mission of the Jumanos and Quiviras were east of Socorro, on

the “Mesa Jumana.” He was a Jumano Indian--perhaps the last who passed

for one. Attention was then turned at once to the region east of

Socorro. The country beyond the Sierra Oscura, between the Rio Grande

and the Pecos, had remained uninhabited after the insurrection of 1680,

and the small settlements of Manzano and Abó, in the vicinity of the

Great Salt Lake, were not founded till about 1841 and 1869. The Apaches

Taraones and the Comanches had, as it were, frightened all life away

from the region. Ruins of pueblos and imposing stone churches, burnt

out, with their enclosures open to the sky and the clouds, remains of

the modest prosperity which the pueblo Indians enjoyed under the

guidance of the Franciscan monks, before their unfortunate insurrection,

lie scattered on the cliffs. Definite recollections are associated with

all these ruins; the descendants of the Indians of Cuaray, Chililé, and

Tajique still live at Isleta in Texas, and the posterity of the

inhabitants of Abó at Senecú near El Paso del Norte. The existence of

these ruins and a dim outline of their history were never absent from

the recollections of the Spaniards.

Touching the Valley of Abó on the east and the basin of the Salt Lake on

the north, rises a broad mesa, the borders of which are covered only on

the north side with thin woods. The surface is inclined toward the

south, and is treeless, though covered with good grass, but from the

northern edge of the mesa south, southeast, and southwest, there is for

from thirty to sixty miles not a drop of standing water. While I was

there from the 4th to the 10th of January, 1883, melted snow was my only

drink. This uninhabited plateau is the “Mesa de los Jumanos,” and on its

southeast side stand the ruins of a pueblo which, according to my

measurements, contained about twelve hundred inhabitants, with two stone

churches, one of which is thirty-four feet wide and one hundred and

thirty-two feet long, and stands almost undamaged, except in the roof.

The walls are six feet thick, and a few hewn beams are still left in the

interior. Adjoining these ruins are the walls of a considerable

presbytery. The other church has been reduced to crumbling walls. No

running water is to be found anywhere near, but four large artificial

pools afford enough water for drinking purposes. This is the ruin which

the old Jumano Indian of Socorro in the last century described as the

former mission of Quivira, and which consequently now bears the name of

“_la gran Quivira_.”

The old man was right. In the year 1630 Fray Francesco Letrado undertook

the conversion of the Jumanos after an earlier effort had failed. But

instead of going directly among the Indians, he established himself in a

pueblo of the Piros, and had them build a church for the use both of the

people there and of the inhabitants of the surrounding country. This

pueblo was called the “Tey-paná” in the Piro language, and was the

present _Gran Quivira_, while the ruins of the little church are those

of the smaller temple. The place was the most eastern mission in New

Mexico, and was called _la mision de los Jumanos_. At the same time with

the Jumanos, the Quiviras were visited by the priests; and a number of

members were gradually associated from all these tribes with the people

of the village, and thus the building of a new church became necessary.

This was the newer, larger ruin, and the structure was never quite

completed. The Apaches pressed so closely upon the remote and isolated

village that the mission to the Jumanos was abandoned in 1679. A few

surviving members of the Piros who once dwelt there still live in Jemez,

but the Jumanos and Quiviras have died away.

The history of the mission, too, was lost in the eighteenth century,

although it could be clearly learned from the annals of the church and

in Spanish books and manuscripts. But instead of studying these, men

have peopled the ruins with fanciful figures, and have entered them

cautiously and timidly in superstitious treasure-hunting. Numerous

excavations attest the stay there of persons who have searched for the

golden cups, the candlesticks of solid silver, and all that the fables

ascribed to the poor missionaries of the sixteenth century. Had the

gold-hunters, and, in later times, the water-hunters, considered the

history of the _Gran Quivira_, they might have spared themselves

trouble, labor, much money, and much suffering.

What is true on a small scale of Quivira is true in far greater measure

of New Mexico and its metallic wealth in general. Historical writers

have dealt superficially with that country by taking only a few

authorities (Espejo, for example), and those without adequate criticism,

as the basis of their sketches. Practical life demands of research in

the historical field that it make it acquainted with the experiences of

the past for the use and advantage of the present. Had those experiences

been represented as they are clearly and truthfully laid down in the

Spanish documents, much useless expenditure of capital would have been

spared in New Mexico alone. It cannot be said that those documents were

inaccessible, for the reports of Fray Marcos and of Coronado were

printed in Italy and in England in the sixteenth century, and the works

of Gomara, Herrera, and Torquemada contained the truth in abstracts. A

Spanish officer wrote as early as 1601 that New Mexico was not so bad as

it was occasionally drawn, but was far from being as good as it was

usual to represent the country; and Alexander von Humboldt explicitly

denied (“_Histoire politique du royaume de la Nouvelle Espagne_,” vol.

ii. cap. viii. 3d book, p. 246) the existence there of rich beds of ore.

In spite of this he has often been brought forward as authority for the

assertion that the richest mines in the world were once opened there and

in Arizona. The truth as to the metallic wealth of the country lies

between the two extremes, but considerably nearer the former; and a

critical study of the documentary history of the region should have been

enough of itself to convince inquiring mankind of the fact.

THE MASSACRE OF CHOLULA (1519).

The day on which occurred the massacre of Cholula--a very important

event in the annals of the Spanish conquest of Mexico--has not been

determined with certainty, but the month is known. It took place about

the middle of October, 1519, probably between the 10th and the 15th. The

usual account of the tragedy--the conception of it regarded as

historical--represents it as a causeless piece of treachery on the part

of the Spaniards, an act of unjustifiable cruelty, an eternal blot on

the fame of Hernando Cortés. Prescott gives the fairest and most exact

expression to this view in his “Conquest of Mexico” when he says: “This

passage in their history is one of those that have left a dark stain on

the memory of the conquerors. Nor can we contemplate, at this day,

without a shudder, the condition of this fair and flourishing capital

thus invaded in its privacy and delivered over to the excesses of a rude

and ruthless soldiery.” At the same time Mr. Prescott excuses the

proceeding as an act of military necessity, and censures only the excess

of the chastisement which Cortés allowed to be inflicted upon the

Indians of Cholula.

A long residence in Cholula has enabled me to become thoroughly

acquainted with the scene of the massacre, and to collect and study the

native traditions concerning it, and their pictorial representations of

it. Many documents referring to the slaughter have also come to light

since Prescott’s work was published. These papers set the transaction in

a new light, and illustrate how important to the composition of a

correct historical account of an event is a previous study of its

details and the local conditions.

Most incorrect and exaggerated ideas prevail concerning the condition of

Cholula at the beginning of the sixteenth century, even in works admired

for their apparent thoroughness; and of this Prescott is an example and

proof. “The Cholulan capital,” he says, “was the great commercial

emporium of the plateau.... Not a rood of land but was under

cultivation.” From the top of the artificial hill (falsely called a

pyramid) the spectator saw “the sacred city of Cholula, with its bright

towers and pinnacles sparkling in the sun, reposing amidst gardens and

verdant groves, which then thickly studded the cultivated environs of

the capital.” On the summit of what was called the pyramid “stood a

sumptuous temple.”

These passages are examples of the conceptions that are current, and

specimens, as well, of inaccuracy and exaggeration. Concerning the

pyramid so often mentioned, I appeal to the testimony of the authors

whom Prescott is accustomed to cite. They agree that at the time of the

arrival of the Spaniards this great artificial hill had long been in

ruins and was overgrown with bushes. The top of the hill was then

convex, and crowned with a “little ancient temple” dedicated to the god

_Nahui Quiahuitl_, or nine rains. There was no trace of a large

building, and the pyramid looked so much like a wooded hill that the

conquerors regarded it as a natural elevation.

Cholula was not a capital, for it had no cities or villages attached to

it, nor any rural population. I have investigated in the archives the

development of the present district from the earliest period of Spanish

rule, and have shown (“An Archæological Tour in Mexico”) that all the

Indian villages date from the sixteenth, seventeenth, and eighteenth

centuries; that the few more ancient remains besides Cholula--except the

sacrificial hill of Calpan--belong to a far more ancient period, and had

been long deserted and forgotten when Cortés conquered Mexico; and that

the whole tribe of Cholula dwelt together in six quarters, which were

erected on the ground covered by the present city of Cholula and commune

of San Andrés Cholula. The environs of these six quarters, which were

separated from one another by open places, were cultivated; but the

plantations extended no farther out. Three fourths of the present

district lay fallow, where now forty villages with twenty thousand souls

are supported by the cultivation of the soil.

The architecture of the natives did not include “sparkling towers.” The

one-storied, flat houses were whitewashed with plaster, and above them

rose the rounded artificial sacrificial hill, on the narrow level spaces

of the summit of which stood little tower-shaped chapels. The view of

this whole complex, like that of the Indian pueblos of New Mexico, was

very striking and very deceiving as to the real number of people, which

appeared nearly twice as large as it actually was. Furthermore, as in

the present villages of New Mexico, hardly more than two thirds of the

houses are inhabited, and one is led to overestimate the population

greatly.

Cholula was neither a specially sacred city nor an emporium of trade.

The people had their gods, like any other of the tribes, and among them

Quetzal-cohuatl was held in high reverence. Pilgrims did not flock to

his shrine from near and far, as to Einsiedeln or Mecca, and the lordly

neighbors of Tlascala and Huexotzinco, as well as those of Mexico,

regarded the idol of Cholula, accordingly as they felt friendly or

hostile toward it, as representing a gallant hero, or a blasphemous

image, or an evil spirit.

The trade of Cholula did not surpass that which other equally numerous

tribes possessed. It was irregular and limited. As the Pueblo Indians

used to go a few years ago to the Comanches, in well-guarded caravans,

or, till 1859, to Sonora, sometimes to the loss of their goods and even

of their lives, so in aboriginal Mexico they went in armed companies to

the neighboring tribes for purposes of trade. Cholula was a good market,

for its inhabitants were producers of cochineal, and as it was nearer

the lowlands than the Mexican plateau and Tlascala, it was a place where

traders could exchange their own products for tropical fruits and

decorative articles. Feathers of richly colored birds were very much in

demand. Parrots and _Trogon resplendens_ came through Tehuacan to

Cholula. The people of that region, on the other hand, had no salt.

There is a considerable difference, however, between this primitive

trade and a great inland market. What is great and important to an

Indian people will appear to a European, as soon as the first impression

of strangeness has worn off, often very insignificant. All the

descriptions of the high civilization and the magnitude ascribed to

Cholula rest upon the testimony of Spanish eye-witnesses, and have been

composed without due regard to the sort of comparisons the Spaniards

were able at that time to make. When, for example, Cortés compared

Tlascala with Granada and Cempohual with Seville, we should not only

consider how large those cities were in the year 1519, but should

especially recollect that the comparisons only related to superficial

extent. Every Indian town contains much more vacant space than any

European city of the same area. All these accounts are therefore nearly

as inexact as the political “campaign documents” of the present. Without

really intending to state what was false, the authors of them

involuntarily exaggerated in favor of their predilections. Everything

was misunderstood at first, or not understood at all; the character of

the people and their manners and customs were novel and bewildering. The

population of a place was always greatly overestimated, for wherever the

Spaniards showed themselves the people ran together, and the same

throngs accompanied them all around, so that they met at every step a

multitude that gave the appearance of great traffic.

Cholula had in its original condition not many more than 25,000

inhabitants, who were divided among the six quarters that surrounded, at

considerable intervals, the chief sacrificial hill. The hill rose out of

the usual walled court and stood where to-day stand the great

Franciscan cloister of San Gabriel and the _capilla real_. At present

not 10,000 people dwell in the city and in San Andrés, but the whole

district contains at least as many Indians as inhabited it before the

conquest, except that they live scattered over the land, and not, as

formerly, together in an extensive pueblo.

The tribe of Cholula was tributary to no one; it belonged to the large

number of settled groups which, wholly independent of one another,

comprised the native population of old Mexico. Among these groups, which

were all military democracies with elective officers, never hereditary

monarchies or despotisms, three had joined in a confederation and had

become very dangerous to all the others. They were the tribes of the

Mexican Valley: Mexico, Tezcuco, and Tlacopan. Mexico took the lead in

warlike affairs: Montezuma was simply the commander-in-chief of the

soldiers of the three tribes, and not a crowned head. The allies were

the most dangerous enemies of Cholula. Yet when the Spaniards had forced

themselves into the present Mexico, Cholula had approached them, or

rather the Confederation had approached the Cholulans, in order to

obtain a support against Tlascala and against the powerful strangers who

had just concluded an alliance with the Tlascalans.

Not much regard was felt in the neighborhood[89] for the shrine of the

holy Quetzal-cohuatl, but its people were generally looked upon as

cowards and knaves, and its idol as a “bad medicine”; and every appeal

was made to Cortés to induce him not to go by way of Cholula to Mexico.

In Cholula the people were not pleased with the sojourn of the Spaniards

in Tlascala, for that tribe stood in bad repute among them. It was

inclined to favor Cholula’s neighbors of Huexotzinco, between whom and

Cholula bloody feuds prevailed at the time over a question of

water-supply. Quarrels of this kind were frequent, for the

Huexotzintecans controlled the upper course of the streams with which

the Cholulans irrigated their gardens. If a Cholulan looked awry at a

Huexotzintecan, or met him in hunting and reviled him, or a

Huexotzintecan came to the market in Cholula and was overreached, the

Huexotzintecans cut off the water from their neighbors, and war ensued.

The dispute has lasted till the present day, with the difference that

the Spaniards have suppressed the murders of former times, and have

directed complainants to the courts.

Notwithstanding the strained relations which prevailed at that time

between Cholula and Tlascala, four inhabitants of Cholula called upon

Cortés and invited him to visit their tribe. The Tlascalans advised him

not to go, and asserted that those men were not deputies, but

unimportant personages. But little attention has been given to this

episode; it has even been overlooked. It came about in the following

way:

The Mexican Confederation regarded the friendly relations between the

Spaniards and their hereditary enemies of Tlascala with great concern,

and made more earnest efforts to come to a good understanding with

Cholula. Through its envoys it stirred up the tribe of Cholula against

the strangers, and succeeded in winning at least three of the quarters

to its side. At the same time it was anxious that Cortés, in case he

insisted on going on to Mexico, should not pass over the territory of

Huexotzinco, for that tribe was decidedly hostile to the Confederation.

Mexicans were present with the Spanish troops, both messengers and

spies. They were ignorant of what was going on at Mexico and Cholula,

but urged a march by way of Cholula, in order to withdraw the strangers

as soon as possible from their alliance with Tlascala. The Spaniards

knew nothing of this confusion; the thing of most importance to them

seemed to be to secure the submission of one tribe after another. They

felt sure as to Huexotzinco, and were anxious to have Cholula decide in

their favor. Cortés therefore sent Indian commissioners thither.

What took place in Cholula cannot be learned from Spanish sources; but

Indian paintings preserved at San Juan Cuauhtlantzinco, which were shown

me, afford information on the subject. Their evidence is confirmed by

the traditions which are still current in and around Cholula.

The summons of Cortés aroused much consternation in Cholula, where great

fear prevailed concerning the mysterious visitors, and their presence

was not desired at all. But a few, amongst whom were some men of

influence, thought it would be better to ally themselves with the

Spaniards. Against the voice of the majority, they went secretly to

Tlascala and invited Cortés to go to Cholula. Cortés, urged by the

Tlascalans, sent these men home, with a peremptory demand upon the tribe

to send him officially a formal invitation, otherwise he would regard

them as enemies and make war upon them. The Indians conveyed this

message to the council which constituted the chief authority of the

tribe of Cholula.

The Indian sources which I have consulted represent the effect of this

threatening message as a double one. The first effect was against the

messengers, who were bound and imprisoned as traitors, then put into a

_temazcalli_ (or sweat-bath), for the purpose of smothering them with

vapors of red pepper. This treatment was not successful, and the

intended victims escaped. As much fear as anger prevailed against the

Spaniards, and it was decided not to meet them with hostilities, but to

respond to the demand of Cortés and send to Tlascala a formal invitation

to him. When the strangers were once within the walls of Cholula then

they could be disposed of. The Mexican envoys stirred the fire of

excitement.

A large deputation from Cholula went to the Spanish headquarters,

bearing gifts and messages of peace and hospitality, and attended the

ceremonies which Cortés instituted to make them vassals to the Spanish

Crown. Although the true meaning of this transaction was not apparent to

the Indians, yet, as nothing was asked of them, they thought that if it

did no good it would do them no harm, and conducted themselves as they

were desired to do. The Spaniards considered that the Cholulans had

voluntarily pledged themselves by the act to be subjects of the Spanish

Crown. They did not know that a hundred formal oaths taken by the chiefs

could bind the tribe only when they had been commissioned for that

purpose by the tribe itself and armed with power to enter into the

engagement in its name. The embassy from Cholula was delegated only to

amuse the Spaniards, and as a decoy.

The Tlascalans, while they, too, had no clear comprehension of this

“submission to the Crown,” recognized that the purposes of the Cholulans

could not be sincere. They inferred this from their own usages. Certain

religious ceremonies were essential to the obligation of a pledge, and

when these were not observed, the engagement was without binding effect.

Although discord now existed between the two tribes, they knew or could

understand what was going on. The Tlascalans knew that the oracle at

Cholula had said, “Let the strangers only come...;” and they cautioned

the Spaniards against treachery. Cortés, in order not to show weakness,

and in order also to secure a new base against emergencies, decided,

nevertheless, to continue his march through Cholula. He had less than

five hundred men and his small guns. His new allies of Tlascala

furnished him a few thousand men.[90] On the first day he came to the

place where the little village of Xoxtla now stands, nine or ten miles

north of the pueblo, and, according to the often very untrustworthy

Bernal Diaz, one league, or 2-7/10 miles from the Indian plantations.

These plantations were those of Coronanco, seven miles from Cholula,

where the Indians had a few houses and fields--not a real village, but

temporary lodgings. A considerable delegation came to the Spaniards on

the next morning in order to welcome them outside of the place. As

usual, it included the chief officers--the two highest chiefs,[91] and

the medicine-men, or priests, in ample robes, black, red and black, and

all red. They carried incense-vessels in their hands, and perfumed the

strangers. These attentions were interpreted by the Spaniards as signs

of honor, submission, and even reverence; they were not aware that the

Mexican Indians perfumed prisoners of war whom they expected afterward

to sacrifice.

It could not surprise them much that the Cholulans demanded that as the

Tlascalans were enemies they should not encamp within the circuit of the

dwellings. The condition was reasonable, and Cortés agreed to it. The

Indian allies remained near the present village of Santa Maria

Coronanco, while the Spaniards went farther on, in the midst of a

multitude that grew constantly more numerous. All Cholula came out to

see the white men, their dress and weapons, and especially their

wonderful horses. This multitude was not satisfied with seeing the

strangers pass by; but the Indians followed them, as children run after

a circus procession. Bernal Diaz says characteristically of the scene,

“So great was the crowd that came to see us, that the streets and roofs

were filled with them.” The six quarters all turned out at once upon the

line of march of the Spaniards, so that the same public was around them

everywhere. There were, in fact, as Andrés de Tápia says, more than

twelve thousand men and women of all ages, and they gave the impression

of a population probably approaching a hundred thousand. Hence the

“twenty thousand households” (_veintemil casas_) of Cortés. The word

casa applied to an Indian settlement would not signify a single house,

but a household.

Any one who has witnessed a dance of the sedentary Indians, with the

throngs of spectators on the flat roofs, may form a conception of the

diversified scene which this entrance of the Spaniards into Cholula

afforded. I have seen in these dances women in their ancient dress, with

the hair done up in the style of a turban, the short _uipil_, or

sleeveless waistcoat, made of cotton cloth and embroidered with red,

black, and white figures, through which the head and neck projected, and

beneath it a long skirt, girt around the body; the men, excepting the

officers, bareheaded, in white robes, and also in embroidered jackets;

on the heads of the principal officers, the half-mitre, adorned with

colored feathers, colored stones, and shells; the priests in black; all

the faces painted in festive style, that is, hideously striped, those of

the common people with cochineal on the cheeks and forehead, and those

of the higher chiefs with green, blue, and yellow, and the faces of the

priests black, with white rings round the eyes and mouth. Added to these

features were the noise of large and small drums, the squeaking of

pipes, the roaring, thumping sound of the “Tozacatl,” and the clattering

of many rattles. The Spaniards marched slowly along in the midst of this

uproar, while the horses walked under their armored riders, not proudly

and defiantly, but gently and rarely shying; for these horses had till

now been engaged in hard and dangerous service, and much worse awaited

them.

Of such character, according to the accounts of Indian writers of the

sixteenth century, were the reception processions of the natives of

Mexico. If we add to this picture the little company of Spaniards with

their uniforms, their horses, and their small artillery, we can imagine

the entrance of Cortés into Cholula as a festival far less formal and

ceremonious than most of the historians have represented it, but still

extraordinary, gorgeous, and strange enough. I have found the first

impression in all the Indian dances well-nigh overpowering, but the eye

gradually becomes accustomed to regard the spectacle with indifference.

The Spaniards, dazzled by the sight, wavering between heed to the

warning of the Tlascalans and a favorable interpretation of the bearing

of the people of Cholula, could not help regarding with wonder and

suspicion whatever might reveal the real feeling of the people. They

observed that the road was interrupted by ditches and depressions, and

that sling-stones were piled up on the flat roofs. The first sign seemed

very suspicious and appeared to confirm certain statements of the

Tlascalans. The depressions indicated pitfalls, or at least devices to

stop their horses. The ditches, on the other hand, were not trenches,

but simply the channels of the smaller irrigation rills such as run

through the roads everywhere in the southwest. The Spaniards now saw

them for the first time, and were naturally suspicious of them. To them,

as to the Indians, whatever was new was doubtful. The piles of gravel on

the roofs were at all events a warlike provision, but it is still

questionable whether they were intended particularly for the Spaniards.

Most of the Indian villages were open, and were defended directly from

the houses, or, in case of extremity, from the sacrificial hills; and

piles of sling-stones were always kept convenient and ready for this

event. Cholula lay in a plain, with the heights of Tzapotecas three

miles away. It had no walls, and an assailing enemy must of necessity be

repelled from the roofs of the houses. The Spaniards not properly

understanding the conditions, these hostile precautions seemed to them

to be directly opposed to what had appeared a formal voluntary

submission of the Cholulans. Cortés was moved by them to suspect

treachery.

While thus many of the external signs were mistakenly interpreted by

him, he was right in the main. The Indian paintings at Cuauhtlantzinco

confirm the native story that the people of Cholula had prepared a trap

for him; but not, as Bernal Diaz declares, with the aid of a corps of

troops from Mexico. The Mexicans could not furnish such aid, for they

had not the means; their own tribe numbered hardly 40,000 souls, and

their allies hardly 60,000. Had they indeed ventured to appear in the

neighborhood with 20,000 men, Cholula would not have permitted them to

concentrate such a force on its territory; especially as they were its

hereditary enemies. It was, besides, impossible to conceal even 10,000

men in that region so that, even though not visible to the Spaniards,

they could escape the peering eyes of the Tlascalans who were encamped

without. The tale of the auxiliaries from Mexico is a fable, like many

other of the stories in the history of the Conquest of Mexico. The

origin of the story, which the Spaniards really believed, is of great,

of momentous significance.

The Spaniards were quartered in a large house surrounding a courtyard,

which they supposed to be a public building. According to tradition,

Cortés was lodged in the present southwestern quarter of the city, which

is now called “Santa Maria Tecpan”--the “Tecpan” being the communal

house where strange visitors were received. In the middle of the quarter

there still stands, in the _Calle de Herreros_, an ancient portal, with

the inscription, in the Nahuatl language and Latin letters, “Here stood

the Tecpan, where now is the house of Antonio de la Cruz.” The Spaniards

were therefore really residing in a government building, but at the same

time in private dwellings, for each quarter formed a connected complex,

which had been temporarily vacated to give accommodation to the

strangers. The people gathered in a crowd outside, and this gave the

start to the story that a hostile force was lurking around Cholula.

In assigning a dwelling of this character to the Spaniards, the

Cholulans enclosed them as if in a fortress, for the thick walls were

proof against every attempt to break through them with native

implements. The entrance indeed had no doors, but guards with guns and

cannon were so planted that they covered the larger openings, and showed

the Indians, or rather might have shown them, that an assault would be

dangerous. The people of Cholula did not know what sort of guests they

had invited, or what means they possessed for opposing any treachery.

The behavior of the Cholulans was in direct contradiction to the popular

view that they regarded the white men as gods. One does not entice gods

into traps, and does not try, as was done after the coming of the

Spaniards, to enfeeble them gradually by depriving them of food. Both

devices were tried against Cortés and his companions.

The intercourse of the Spaniards with the natives was very limited. In

the first place, neither could understand the other; and in the second

place, Cortés restrained his men so far as he could from going outside

of the quarter. Only the young Indian woman Marina, who had been given

to the Spaniards at Tabasco, on account of her precious ability to speak

both Maya and Nahuatl--who has been the theme of much descriptive

writing and verse, and whose career as interpreter and mistress has been

invested with a poetical nimbus not appropriate to it--went in and out,

diligently using her eyes. A broad affection, which extended from the

common soldiers to the commander-in-chief, attached the woman to the

Spanish flag. It was said also in Cholula that the wives of those whom

Cortés first visited in Tlascala, and who were threatened with death by

strangulation, had talked in secret about their tribal kinsmen. Cortés

was soon convinced that the people were removing their women and

children, not only from the quarter assigned to him, but everywhere.

Every one who is acquainted with Indians knows what that proceeding

means. It is the incontestable evidence of hostile intentions, and only

individuals can in such case, perhaps, escape. Had the Spaniards

withdrawn upon the discovery of this fact, they would have been

attacked in the streets, and might easily have been exposed to a

slaughter far more disastrous to them than that which they afterwards

suffered in the famous _noche trista_. They were secure where they were

against an open attack. All Cholula could not have carried the quarter

by storm in the face of the Spanish muskets and artillery. But the

adoption by the Cholulans of the formidable instrumentality of gradual

starvation compelled action. Cortés determined upon a measure which

would have been wholly unjustifiable in time of peace. The Spaniards,

however, knew that treachery, not peace, was in the air, and the Indians

confessed it. The situation was such that only stratagem could deliver

them from the snares that had been set for them.

Search was first made for the Mexican deputies who had been with the

Spaniards, but they had gone away and had only left their attendants.

The chief officers of Cholula were no longer to be seen in the Spanish

headquarters, and Cortés had two priests called and questioned in his

presence. Presents, cross-questionings, and threats were employed to

extort a confession that the destruction of the Spaniards was

contemplated. Cortés immediately sent word through these priests to the

chiefs of the tribe to come to him, and they came. The Spanish commander

reproached them courteously for their reserve, asked them why they had

estranged themselves from him in such a way, and intimating to them that

he would start for Mexico on the following day, asked for a number of

their soldiers to escort him, and for porters. His request was very

readily granted, even with professions of lively pleasure. But while

Cortés was thus treating with them, messengers arrived from his Indian

allies with urgent communications. Both Tlascalans and Indians from

Cempohual, of whom a few hundred accompanied the Spaniards, brought

reports that threatening proceedings were going on outside of the

Spanish quarter. The people were collecting more stones on the roofs,

and were barring and building up the passages. Pits had been discovered

in the streets, or rather in the vacant spaces between the quarters,

lightly covered with limbs of trees and earth. If was certain that all

non-combatants had been sent away. Everything pointed to an impending

outbreak of hostilities. The Spaniards, not being acquainted with the

Indian custom of making no assault at night except under the most

favorable circumstances, or in case of necessity, expected to be

attacked immediately after dark. The number of men in the previously

deserted space around the Spanish quarter was visibly increasing, and

among them were some armed. As night came on, Cortés assembled his men

for anxious consultation. Some proposed to evacuate Cholula and retire

to Huexotzinco; but the majority, perceiving that it was too late for

that, favored attacking the Cholulans on the next morning, before they

could strike a blow.

While these measures were being determined upon, two Indians of the

place, an old woman and her son, came secretly to the Marina whom we

have mentioned. She was regarded, by virtue of her origin and her

language, as belonging to the Nahuatls, and as she was, besides, a

good-looking girl, and made considerable display of the presents which

she had acquired from the Spaniards, she was regarded among her

countrymen as desirable for marriage. The woman came to the girl in

order to warn her and save her, and at the same time to secure her for

one of her sons. Marina obtained from her a relation, to the minutest

detail, of the whole plan of the conspiracy, how the Spaniards were to

be attacked in the ravines and roads on their march to Mexico, and other

particulars. Her story fully confirmed the statements of the priests.

Marina detained the woman under the pretext that she wished to prepare

to go away, and ran to Cortés to tell him all. The poor wife-hunter was

consequently brought before the commander, closely questioned, and

confined for the night with her son, while the Spanish soldiers prepared

to march.

When morning broke, all was ready for departure, and armed Cholulans

gathered around the lately deserted quarter, ostensibly to accompany the

Spaniards, but really in order to attack them at the first opportunity.

Both sides were alike ready, and the only question was, which should be

first. The Spaniards had the advantage of knowing the designs of their

perfidious hosts, while the latter had no suspicion that the whites were

aware of their treachery. As soon as the Spanish guards permitted it,

the court of the quarter was filled with Indians. They exhibited all the

signs of satisfaction, in the false fancy that their success was

assured. Cortés was already on his horse, with Marina by his side, the

cavalry were mounted, and the infantry held their guns ready to fine.

Orders had been sent to the Tlascalans during the night to hasten up on

the first alarm. When the chiefs of Cholula had gathered around Cortés,

he plainly told them through the mouth of the Indian interpreter that he

had penetrated their designs. He said to them, without passion, that he

knew all, and that, as they were bound to the Spanish Crown, having

voluntarily made their submission to it, they should therefore be

punished, according to Spanish law, as traitors and rebels. Before the

Indians could recover from their astonishment, he gave the signal for

attack, and the fight began with the firing of muskets into the throng.

It lasted about five hours.

There was no slaughter of unarmed women and children. The non-combatants

had been sent out of the way long before by the Cholulans to a place of

security, with the exception of those in the remote quarters, who did

not participate in the contest and were not harmed by the Spaniards. It

was a house and street fight between armed whites who had anticipated

likewise armed Indians, and had therefore secured to themselves the

advantage of the assault. Many Indians were killed in the court--a

relatively large number, it is said, perhaps more than a hundred men.

This part of the affair occurred where the present Calle de Chalingo

passes into the Calle Real, and the place is still called the “Ezcoloc,”

or the place of the flowing and crossing of meandering streams of blood.

According to tradition, Cortés had his headquarters in the same system

of houses. The action could not last long in the court, for the

Cholulans, after the first volleys, rushed out of the trap into the open

space, which they could easily do, as no doors prevented their exit.

But they could not be allowed to go unpunished even outside, for the

Spaniards were exposed to the danger of a siege by starvation. They also

rushed out, and their enemies, driven by their guns, fled to the “Cerro

de la Cruz,” a sacrificial mound still partly standing, about 1100 feet

east of the spot where the fight began. Here, according to the pictures

at Cuauhtlantzinco, the principal engagement took place, in the storming

of the artificial height. After this, all was over. The Cholulans who

were involved in the conspiracy and were surprised belonged to three of

the six principal quarters, while the three other quarters had been

neutral and now interceded for peace. Cortés contented himself with this

short chastisement, and did not permit his people to scatter--prudently,

for that might have been very disastrous. In the afternoon he drew his

troops back into the quarter, and the negotiations were begun which

established peace and a good understanding.

In the meantime, when the fight was already on the wane, the Tlascalans

rushed up in thick masses. They eagerly overran the empty houses in

order to plunder them. It is self-evident that none of the inhabitants

who fell into their hands were spared. But there were not many, for the

unarmed had long ago betaken themselves to places of security; the

soldiers were busy with the Spaniards, and the heroes of Tlascala did

not venture against non-participants and their closed houses. Like

genuine Indians, they contented themselves with robbery and the

destruction of property: there was no extensive conflagration; the

“smoking ruins” of Prescott could not exist where roof-beams loaded

with earth and plaster were the only combustibles. Such a laying waste

of Cholula as is represented by some authors would require pulling it

down, and that could not be accomplished in so short a time as five

hours. Yet five hours after the first shot was fired, Cortés stopped the

proceedings of his companions. Many of them undoubtedly continued to

steal privately; and on the next day reënforcements came from Tlascala

for the purpose of recompensing themselves from the Cholulans and their

property, but they were prevented from doing this by the strict orders

of the Spanish commander. Andrés de Tápia speaks of a two days’

destruction, but Cortés, in a letter which he wrote a year after the

affair, affirmed that the place was again full of women and children on

the next day.[92]

Cortés stated that about three thousand of the enemy were killed. In

1529 Nuño de Guzman accused him of having caused four thousand Indians

to be slain in a large court in Cholula. The witnesses whom Cortés

brought forward swore that a “few” Indians were indeed punished there

with death. Las Casas, whose statements cannot be trusted on account of

his strong passion, speaks of six thousand dead. The local conditions

speak more definitely, and, above all, the duration of the battle. It is

hardly conceivable that even if the conflict lasted five hours, five

hundred Spaniards could have killed so large a number of Indians in that

time. The first volleys may have been murderous, but after them the

affair became a skirmish, with single brief and bloody combats at close

quarters. The Tlascalans had no time to kill many.

I am very doubtful, especially when I recollect that the battle was

fought on a space not an English quarter of a mile in length, whether

more than five hundred men fell. Certainly nothing like what is called a

“decline” of Cholula was caused by the massacre. The Indian population

of the district is still as large as it was then, notwithstanding fatal

epidemics have prevailed. The only difference between the past and

present conditions of population is that the tribe has now dispersed

into the country, while in the year 1519 it dwelt together in a group of

complexes.

But even if only one Indian was killed without just cause, it would be a

serious crime. Yet from a military point of view the conduct of Cortés

is entirely justified. He was obliged to proceed in that way, to

surprise the Indians, if he would not himself be surprised and

destroyed. The reproach brought against him is not based upon the

Cholula incident, but lies against the conquest in general, against

every aggression of the kind, and against our own conduct toward the

Indians.

Only the pretexts have changed with the times, while the means have

become, through the advance of knowledge, surer and more destructive.

The Spaniards took and held the land, and saved its inhabitants: in the

United States we have destroyed the people to get their land. The

Spaniards subdued the aborigines openly: we approach them in the

disguise of neighbors, pursue them and vex them, often for years at a

time, till the desired offence is committed which affords us a pretext

for removing them or exterminating them. The history of Arizona since

the United States forcibly incorporated that territory into its domain

furnishes much worse and more blameworthy transactions than the

“bloodbath” of Cholula. If we can excuse these and other wrongs, and can

justify our whole systematic robbery and destruction of the Indians

under the pretence of progress, then we cannot be judges against the

Conquest. The Spaniards planted the European civilization of their time

in the place of the rude semi-civilization that existed, and adapted the

natives to it: we plant our present civilization without taking a

thought for the continued existence of the Indians.

THE AGE OF THE CITY OF SANTA FE.