100 LIFE IN THE FAR WEST. 



posture, the fire shedding a glowing light upon the horrid spectacle. 

 The face was a mass of clotted blood, which flowed from the 

 lacerated scalp, while gouts of blood streamed from eight gaping 

 wounds in the naked breast. 



Slowly this frightful figure rose to a sitting posture, and, bending 

 slowly forward to the fire, the mouth was seen to open wide, and a 

 hollow gurgling — owg-h-h — broke from it. 



" H — I" exclaimed the trapper — and jumping up, he placed a 

 pistol to the ghastly head, the eyes of which sternly fixed them- 

 selves on his, and pulling the trigger, blew the poor wretch's skull 

 to atoms. 



The Gila passes through a barren, sandy country, with but little 

 game, and sparsely inhabited by several different tribes of the 

 great nation of the Apache. Unlike the rivers of this western 

 region, this stream is, in most parts of its course, particularly 

 toward its upper waters, entirely bare of timber, and the bottom, 

 through which it runs, aflbrds but little of the coarsest grass. 

 While on this stream, the trapping party lost several animals for 

 want of pasture, and many more from the predatory attacks of the 

 cunning Indians. These losses, however, they invariably made 

 good whenever they encountered a native village — taking care, 

 moreover, to repay themselves with interest whenever occasion 

 offered. 



Notwithstanding the sterile nature of the country, the trappers, 

 during their passage up the Gila, saw with astonishment that the 

 arid and barren valley had once been peopled by a race of men far 

 superior to the present nomade tribes who roam over it. With no 

 little awe they gazed upon the ruined walls of large cities, and the 

 remains of houses, with their ponderous beams and joists, still 

 testifying to the skill and industry with which they were con- 

 structed ; huge ditches and irrigating canals, now filled with rank 

 vegetation, furrowed the plains in the vicinity, marking the spot 

 where once green waving maize and smiling gardens covered what 



