104 The National Geographic Magazine 



ranges on north and south, trickles per- 

 manently over the sands of a broad wash 

 occasionally swept by the freshets fol- 

 lowing storms in the same mountains; 

 here the refugees began anew the de- 

 velopment of tribal character; and here 

 began their unwritten Book of Leviti- 

 cus, following their Genesis and Exo- 

 dus in curiousl}' Hebraic order, in their 

 Ancient Sacred Tales. Devotees (like 

 other lowly folk ) to the dark mysteries 

 of unstudied nature, they had brought 

 their old faith with them, but enshrined 

 it anew in their second Eden; carrying 

 a cult of the sea — a vestige of littoral life 

 in earlier generations — in which they 

 worshipped the ocean as the infinitely 

 potent Mother of Waters, and finding 

 their faith sharpened fearsomely by the 

 incomparable preciousness of fluid in 

 these outer deserts, they enjoined on 

 their young men pilgrimages to the 

 Gulf at its nearest point as sacramental 

 requisites for entering into the stage 

 and condition of full manhood; bringing 

 vSeed of maize and beans from ancestral 

 gardens, they not only planted but 

 cherished their crops with a consuming 

 watchfulness growing into actual wor- 

 ship, and finally giving name to both 

 locality and tribe — for oasis and river 

 came to be known as the Place of Corn 

 (Sonoyta, as commonly written), and the 

 tribe as Beans People (papahoaatam).* 

 The habit of eternal vigilance on the 

 part of the Papago of defense or flight, 

 according to the strength of invading 

 parties, led to the placing of outposts 

 as far east of Sonoyta and as near to 

 the Apache range as might be ; and 

 eventually a semi-symbolic outpost was 

 established at the most conspicuous 

 and impressive landmark of all Papa- 

 gueria — Baboquivari Peak. This sta- 

 tion was supported partly by shamans 

 armed with magical devices, partly by 

 bold and athletic warriors who could be 

 trusted to traverse the hundred miles of 



* Cf. "Papagueria," The Nattonai, Geo- 

 graphic Magazine, vol. ix, 1898, p. 345. 



desert to Sono5'ta between noon-day 

 suns; and there is traditional evidence 

 that the granite walls of the peak — so 

 lofty and precipitous that but one Cau- 

 casian * has scaled them — were climbed 

 and its crest occupied by at least one 

 part)' of tribesmen. In time Baboqui- 

 vari became the Sacred Mount of all the 

 Papago; and as the tribe multiplied and 

 flowed feebly back toward the ancestral 

 valleys, the sacramental pilgrimage of 

 the young men was so extended as to 

 cover the 150 miles from Baboquivari to 

 the sea, with Sonoyta as a way station. 

 A half of the path thus trodden by the 

 Papago pilgrims from some centuries 

 before Columbus up to the beginning of 

 the twentieth century was that retrodden 

 by Caucasians for a century and a third 

 as the Yuma trail. 



THE COMING OF THE CAUCASIAN. 



The first foreigners to approach the 

 ancient trail were Alvar Nuiiez Cabeza 

 de Vaca and his companions (in all, 

 three whites and one black), as they 

 near the end of the most remarkable 

 tran.scontinental journey in the history 

 of America, in the spring of 1536; three 

 or four years later Coronado's army also 

 approached and perhaps crossed within 

 sight of Baboquivari, and it is practically 

 certain that a detachment of this army 

 actually followed the footsteps and guid- 

 ance of the Papago pilgrims over a part 

 of the trail. It was in September, 1540, 

 that Captain Melchior Diaz set out from 

 Coronado's headquarters at Corazones 

 (at or near the site of the present Ures) 

 with a force of 25 men in the hope of 

 intercepting Alarpon's fleet on the coast/ 

 and so shaped his course as to strike Rio 

 Colorado a little way above its mouth. 

 His route was never mapped, nor even 

 fully described (he lost his life through 

 an accident in the Colorado country) ; 

 but to one who has traversed the region 



*Prof. R. H. Forbes, of the Territorial Uni- 

 versity of Arizona. ' 



