306 NINTH ANNUAL REPORT OF 



pass from Laguna tie la Puerta, and served for a land-mark towards 

 which to direct our march. Our course was a verj'' straight one ; for 

 the country, which is an open rolling prairie, offered no impediment to 

 our moving in a right line. The weather changed to be very cold 

 during the afternoon ; when near sunset a fierce wind arose from the 

 direction of the snow-clad mountains in the west, and a cold vapor 

 like a cloud came over the country, enveloping everythmg in a dense 

 fog, and covering men and horses with a hoar frost. It was feared 

 that the gale would change into one of those dreadful winter northers 

 which are sometimes experienced in this country, and which are so 

 fatal to men and animals when exposed to their fury on the open 

 -prairie. So the direction of the march was changed, that we might get 

 •the shelter of the timber on the slope of the Mesa de los Tumanes, 

 •which stretched along our right at a distance of not more than three or 

 four miles. This we struck very opportunely, just as night was setting 

 in. We soon had large fires blazing, and all our horses well blanketed 

 and picketed on the leeward side of them, to get the benefit of the 

 heated air and of the eddy in the wind from the long line of tents. In 

 this way they were kept Irom suffering, although the night was uncom- 

 monly cold and inclement. 



So still another day has passed away, and the ruins are not yet reached. 

 Quivira would seem alwa3^s to have been a difficult place to arrive at. 

 We find in Castaneda's history of the expedition into this country 

 made by Francisco Vasques de Coronado, in 1540, '41, and '42, that that 

 general was forty -eight days in hunting for it, starting from some point 

 between the Rio Grande and the Gila river. All the way from Albu- 

 querque we have asked the people of the country where the ruins 

 were situated"? How they looked"? Who built them"? &c., &c. To 

 all these questions we could seldom get a more definite reply than 

 Quien sabe'^ It seemed as if the genii who, in the Eastern tale at least, 

 -are said to guard the depositories of great treasures, were determined 

 to make the existence of such a place as Gran Quivira as much of a 

 problem to us as to the Mexicans themselves. We had seen, before 

 the fog set in, an edifice in the distance, which had seemed to move 

 away as we approached it, like the weird lakes of water in a mirage. 

 But to-morrow, at all events, will decide for us whether that edifice be 

 a Fata Morgana or not. 



Wednesday, December 21, 1853. 



At daybreak this morning every tree and spire of grass, and even 

 the blankets upon our horses, were covered with ice. The trees 

 seemed as if every twig was made of frosted silver. The wind had 

 gone down, and overhead the sky was clear; bat a lieavy bank of fog 

 extended all along the east, obstructing our view of the Sierra de las 

 Gallinas, which bounds the horizon in that direction. It was long ere 

 the approaching sun waded up through so dense a veil. 



Soon after we left camp we again saw the cathedral of Gran Qui- 

 vira ; but in surmounting one eminence after another as we moved 

 along over a rolling country, the ruins, phantom like, seemed to 

 recede before us the same as yesterday. When we first saw them 

 this morning thev appeared to be about a mile and a half distant, when 



