CHAPTER IX- 



EED EIVEE YALLEY, 



Our "Wagons cross the Eaton Mountains in Safety. — The Surveyors in Diffi- 

 culties. — Eeach the Head-waters of the Canadian Eiver. — Eed Elver 

 (Tei-minal Branch of the Canadian) Valley, — The night-blooming Prairie 

 Lily. — A Fresh Line has to be surveyed from the Purgatoire to Eed Eiver. 

 -Map-making under DifficnltieSj or a Sketch of our Camp Life. — A Visit 

 to Maxwell's Hacienda. — ^The Lidians we found there and their Mode of 

 Life. — Energy and Success of Mr. Maxwell as a Pioneer and Settler. 



Distance : 



mil' 



On Monclayj August 12tli; General Wriglit, General Palmer^ 

 and party, mth four wagons, started for Trinidad and the 

 Eaton Pass, vliile tlie rest of tlie engineers, having completed 

 the survey of Trinchera Pass, struck tents and passed on 

 through it, with the diminished wagon-train, to the south 

 side of the mountains. Having got oiu^ wagons through the 

 pass without accidents of any kind, we camped in the valley 



beyond, which meets it at right angles. Next 

 day we turned down this valley to the left and 

 found a very easy exit from it, at the western foot of the 

 extinct volcano, ^^La Tenaja." This led us into a hroad 

 plain, extending for thirty miles or so in a south-south-western 

 direction towards Fort Union — the largest military post in 

 New jVIexico. In the centre of this plain is a marsh of 

 considerable size, known as ^^ Hay Marsh.' ^ We had had rain 

 nearly every day for a week past, and the groimd was very 

 soft and heavy for the mules ; so, as we did not care to stop 

 by the marsh, we pushed on to the entrance of a valley 



