winship] ALARCON AMONG YUM AN TRIBES 405 



their rulers ate, many men waited about the tables. They ate with 

 napkins, and had baths — a natural inference from any attempt to 

 describe the stuffy underground rooms, the estufas or kivas of the 

 Pueblos. 



Alarcon continued to question the Indian, and learned that the lord 

 of Cibola had a dog like one which accompanied the Spaniards, and that 

 when dinner was served, the lord of Cibola had four plates like those used 

 by the Spaniards, except that they were green. He obtained these at the 

 same time that he got the dog, with sonic other things, from a black man 

 who wore a beard, whom the people of Cibola killed. A few days later, 

 Alarcon obtained more details concerning the death of the negro "who 

 wore certain things on his legs and arms which rattled." When asked 

 about gold and silver, the Indians said that they had some metal of the 

 same color as the bells which the Spaniards showed them. This was 

 not made nor found in their country, but came " from a certain moun- 

 tain where an old woman dwelt." The old woman was called Guatu- 

 zaca. One of Alarcon's informants told him about people who lived 

 farther away than Cibola, in houses made of painted mantles or skins 

 during the summer, and who passed the winter in houses made of wood 

 two or three stories high. The Indian was asked about the leather 

 shields, and in reply described a very great beast like an ox, but more 

 than a hand longer, with broad feet, legs as big as a man's thigh, a head 

 7 hands long, and the forehead 3 spans across. The eyes of the beast 

 were larger than one's list, and the horns as loug as a man's leg, "out 

 of which grew sharp points an handful long, and the forefeet and hind- 

 feet about seven haudfuls big." The tail was large and bushy. To 

 show how tall the animal was, the Indian stretched his arms above his 

 head. In a note to his translation of this description, Hakluyt sug- 

 gests, "This might be the crooke backed oxe of Quivira." Although 

 the height and the horns are clearly those of a buck deer, the rest of 

 the description is a very good account of the bison. 



The man who told him all this was called ashore, and Alarcon noticed 

 an excited discussion going on among the Indians, which ended in the 

 return of his informant with the news that other white men like him- 

 self were at Cibola. Alarcon pretended to wonder at this, and was fold 

 that two men had just come from that country, where they had seen 

 white men having "things which shot tire, and swords." These latest 

 reports seemed to make the Indians doubt Alarcon's honesty, and espe- 

 cially his statements that he was a child of the Sun. He succeeded in 

 quieting their suspicions, and learned more about Cibola, with which 

 these people appeared to have quite frequent intercourse. He was told 

 that the strangers at Cibola called themselves Christians, and that they 

 brought with them many oxen like those at Cibola "and other little 

 blacke beastes with wooll and homes." Some of them also had animals 

 upon which they rode, which ran very swiftly. Two of the party that 

 had recently returned from Cibola, had fallen in with two of the Chris- 



