r 



J 



AZTEC MIGEATION SOUTHWAED. 227 



further up into the ISTarajo country, and tried to protect 

 themselves wherever they went against that trihe hy huilding 

 fortified towns. Thus the seven Moqui villages were builtj 

 and, still further to the north, another cluster of ruins hears 

 record of yet one more colony. To the north-eastward they 

 passed from the heads of Flax Eiver to the southern branches 

 of the San Juan, where they built many populous towns, as 

 the ruins in the Canon dc Chaco and the Yalle de Chelly 

 bear witness, until at last, by following up the head-waters 

 of the Eio dc San Juan into the mountains of Colorado, they 

 entered the commencement of tlie Eio Grande Yalley, and 



- 



and 



subdue. 



■m 



Gradually they worked down the valley from the 



as their traditions assert^ and yery naturally huilt a large 



I 



stronghold at Teas, to protect that magnificent valley against 

 the attacks of XJtes from the mountains, to which it 



c 



was exposed. In time the entire valley was peopled and 

 studded with groups of towns from latitude 37° to 32°, a 

 distance of over four hundred miles. So numerous did the 

 Pueblo Indians beccmc in the main valley that they found 



7 



it unnecessary to live in fortified towns there ; but the settle* 



ments on the outskirts, such as Pecos, Quarra, or Gran 



^ Quivera, where raids from the Buffalo Indians (Arapahoes 



and Comanches) were to be feared, or Laguna and Acoma, 

 unpleasantly near the homes of the IS'avajos, were constructed 

 on the same plan as those in the Colorado basin, and were 



quite as strongly fortified. 



Lastly, it is so short and easy a route from the Eio Grande 

 valley about El Paso—which district, according to early 

 Spanish authorities, contained many towns and a great 



munber of people— to the beautiful and fertile valley of the 



q2 



