A YUCCA SANDAL MANY CENTURIES OLD 



The clever skill and unfailing patience with which the ancient Pueblos wrung from barren nature the 

 things necessary for their existence can be no better illustrated than by this yucca sandal. Leaves 

 of the soap weed were split, trimmed, and plaited to form the tough sole, and cords of fiber 

 from the same plant served as lashings to hold the sole in place. When the soles became 

 worn by sharp stones and grinding sand, they were patched and mended, and often 

 reenforced with a lining of husks. When one gazes upon the vast bulk of the 

 Aztec ruin, and tries to imagine how many thousand pairs of these sandals 

 were worn out by the feet of the workmen as they plied to and from 

 the quarries, one's thought goes forth in tribute to the sturdy bar- 

 barians who dreamed, achieved, and went their way genera- 

 tions before Columbus first set foot on Western shores 



IGS 



