140 LIFE IN THE FAR WEST. 



either to eat or to drink. Valgame Purissirna Maria ! 

 And what is the name of this holy woman ? the world 

 will ask," continues Venabides. " Santa Clara of Car- 

 mona is her name, one well known in my native country, 

 who leaves heaven and all its joys, wends her way to the 

 distant wilds of New Spain, and spends years in inducting 

 the savage people to the holy faith. Truly a pious work, 

 and pleasing to God ! " * 



Thus spoke Venabides the Franciscan, and no doubt he 

 believed what he said ; and many others in Old Spain 

 were fools enough to believe it too, for the shaven heads 

 flocked over in greater numbers, and the cry was ever, 

 "still they come." 



Along the whole extent of the table-lands, not an Indian 

 tribe but was speedily visited by the preaching friars and 

 monks ; and in less than a century after the conquest of 

 Mexico by the Spaniards, these hardy and enthusiastic 

 frayles had pushed their way into the inhospitable regions 

 of New Mexico, nearly two thousand miles distant from 

 the valley of Anahuac. How they succeeded in surmount- 

 ing the natural obstacles presented by the wild and barren 

 deserts they traversed how they escaped the infinite peril 

 they encountered at every step at the hands of the savage 

 inhabitants of the country, with whose language they 

 were totally unacquainted is sufficient puzzle to those 

 who, in the present day, have attempted a journey in the 

 same regions. 



However, it is impossible not to admire the hardihood of 

 these holy pioneers of civilisation, who, totally unfitted by 

 their former mode of life for undergoing such hardships as 

 they must have anticipated, threw themselves into the wil- 

 derness with fearless and stubborn zeal. 



For the most part, however, they found the Indians ex- 

 ceedingly hospitable and well disposed ; and it was not un- 

 til some time after when, receiving from the missionary 

 monks glowing, and not always very truthful, accounts of 



* From a manuscript obtained in Santa F6 of New Mexico, de- 

 scribing the labours of the missionaries Fray Augustin Kuiz, Vena- 

 bides, and Marcos, in the year 1585. 



