484 



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Ex. Doc. No. 4T. 



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the meantime haci sufficient leisure to examine the ruins near Ta- 

 giqae, part of which are at present oO,Vfr>reH by the town. We no- 

 ticed mounds from 6 to 7 feet high, rnnuing due north and south, 

 east and west— an arrangement peculiar to all Indian towns, and 

 which se^ms to be pretty generally adopted by the Mexicans. We 

 picked up some pieces of adobe that looked as if they had been 

 burned by fire. At one place the mounds indicated a building of 

 considerable size'; this we took to have been a place of worship, 

 and afterwards learned that the Mexicans called it the church. 



As we drew close to the present town, we noticed some people 

 digging earth to make adobes; they had exhumed a wall, consisting" 

 of adobes, with a surface of IS by 19 irjches, and a thickness of 2 

 inches. As we pursued cur examinin ioji,s, we found these mounds 

 divided by walls, into chambers not more than 5 feet square. These 

 could not have served for sleeping rooms, as no one could strt-lch 

 out comfortably; we therefore concluded that they must have been 

 the lower stories of buildings, such as those of Taos, Santa Domin- 

 go, and Acoma; and the great mass of debris around these walls, 

 shows that these buildings* were once several stories high. We 

 saw pieces of pottery, similar to that now used at the various Pueb^ 

 los; also arrow heads of milky quar'z, which bear the same pro- 

 portion to the diameter of the arrow in present use, as is here rc- 

 prese 





nted. 



The people who were digging said that they sometimes found 

 ^'metates;" these are the stones called "metlatl," by the Aztecap, 

 on which the Indians put their corn, in order to grind it. One is 

 not likely to observe these mounds unless they are pointed out. 



Bidding farewell to our friends, we started off, and after a march 

 •of 3 miles, in a southwestern direction, we encamped at the village 

 of 'Torreon," a place containing not more than 20 house?, formed 

 in the same manner as those at old Chilili. Here we found a fine 

 large stream, that bursts forth at once from a grand spring in the 

 gide of the ravine above the town. As we approached, some ducks 

 started up from the clear water; they were the teal and mallard, 

 in the afternoon, we went to visit the town, and there saw the 

 looms with which the Mexicans manufacture their tilraas, or 

 blankets— the "tilmatli" of the Aztecas.* These looms are similar 

 to those one meets with in the United States, except in the con- 

 struction, which is of the rudest kind. 



In the CTcning, some of the town folks came to make us a visltj 

 'ihej appeared to be a. very gay-hearted set, and we bad quite »| 



i 



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•3€« Clavis^'r^, 



