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We passed to-day the ruins of two more villages similar to those 
of yesterday. The foundation of the largest house seen yesterday 
was 60 by 20 feet; to-day, 40 by 30. About none did we find 
“any vestiges of the mechanical arts, except the pottery; the stone 
forming the supposed foundation was round and unhewn, and some 
cedar logs were also found about the houses, much decayed, bear- 
ing no mark of an edged tool. Except these ruins, of which not 
one stone remained upon another, no’marks of human hands or foot- 
step have been visible for many. days, until to-day we came upon 
a place where there had been an extensive fire. _ Following the 
course of this fire, as it bared the ground of the shrubbery, and ex- 
posed the soil, &c., to view, I found what was to us a very great 
vegetable.curiosity, a cactus, 18 inches high, and 18 inches in its 
_ greatest diameter, containing 20 vertical volutes, armed with stron 
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spines. When thetraveller is parched with thirst, one of these, split . 
open, will give sufficient liquid to afford relief. Several ‘of these 
cacti were found nearly torn from the earth, and lying in the dry 
bed of a stream. : 
These and the mezquite, acacia, prosopis odorata, and prosopis 
glandulosa, now form the principal growth. Under th name mez- 
quite, the yoyageur com rises all the acacia ‘and prosopis family. 
~ Last night, about nine o’clock, I heard the yell of a wolf, resem- 
bling that. of a four months’ old pup. In a few minutes-there 
was a noise like distant thunder. ‘Stampede !? shouted a fellow, 
and in an instant e F 
rush they had ‘broken. every rope; and this morning, when 
we atarte®, one of our mules was missing, which gave us infinite 
a lazo, as its title. It was settled to the satisfaction of the first. 
The mule was one which Carson had left on’his way out, and on 
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to be useful in packing, and as we now had plenty of beef, it would. 
. 
October 26.—Soon after leaving camp, the banks of the river be- _ 
had made sixteen miles ue we again descended to it. This dis- 
tance occupied eight and a. 
4 
and misery to our best mules. Some did not reach camp 4 
and when the day dawned one or two, who had lost their way : 
seen un the side of the mountain, within a few steps OF a high p 
cipice, from which it required some skill to extricate them. * 
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“the Devil’s turnpike,” and I see no reason to va 
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