180 



purity of their customs. The Pueblo of Taos, near the 

 Rio Grande, has been often visited and described. 



About Santa Fe, on both sides of the Rio Grande, there 

 are many old pueblos, some of which are in ruins, while 

 others have been, in great part, changed to Spanish-Mexi- 

 can towns. In a few, however, the original inhabitants 

 are still in the ascendancy. In many of the canons and 

 smaller valleys, and on many a mesa in Xew Mexico, Col- 

 orado and Arizona, as well as in southern Utah, and also 

 to the south in ]\Iexico, there are numerous ruins of once 

 extensive towns, many of which have been described in 

 the accounts of the various military and exploring expe- 

 ditions. The " seven cities of Cibola," discovered by Cor- 

 onado, have often been mentioned, and some writers have 

 supposed them to refer to the ruins found by Lieut. Simp- 

 son in the Chaco canon, a tributary of the San Juan, 

 but the lecturer was inclined to argue with those writers 

 who placed these "seven cities" in the region about, and 

 including, old Zuui. 



The hundreds of ruins which are now known, including 

 the singular cliif-houses or fastnesses, furnish the evidence 

 of the former greatness of the pueblo people, and their 

 wide distribution over a region which was pr<)bal)ly once 

 better adapted than now for the support of human lifo. 



The lecturer then gave an account of the arts of the 

 pueblo people, calling particular attention to the char- 

 acter of the pottery, of which he exhibited a nuniljer of 

 specimens. This pottery differs Avidely from that found in 

 the mounds and in other parts of the country to the east 

 of the pueblo region, and is of a better type. That found 

 about the ruins and belonging to the early period is baked 

 harder, and in structure and ornament is far superior to 

 that now made at the pueblos on the Rio Grande. That 

 made at Zufii, and the other southern pueblos, is more 



