jACKsox.] RUINS OF SOUTHWEST COLORADO, &C. 419 



with communicating apertures between them. The first room was 9^ 

 feet wide, the others dwindling gradually to only 4 feet in width at the 

 other extremity. The rooms were of unequal length, the following being 

 their inside measurements, commencing from the outer end, viz : 12^, 

 9J, 8, 7^, 9, 10, 8, 7, 7, 8, 31 feet; the ledge then runs along 50 feet far- 

 ther, gradually narrowing, where another wall occurs crossing it, after 

 which it soon merges into the smooth wall of the cave. The first of 

 these rooms had an aperture large enough to crawl through, leading out- 

 ward; thewallaroundit had been broken away so that its exact size could 

 not be determined ; all the others, of which there were about two to each 

 room, were mere peep-holes, about 3 inches in diameter, and generelly 

 pierced through the wall at a downward angle. No sign of either roofing 

 or flooring material could be found in any of the rooms. Everything of 

 that kind has been thoroughly burned out or removed, so that not a vest- 

 ige of wood- work remains. Wecannotbe positively certain that they had 

 ever been roofed, the mild temperature of this region hardly necessitating 

 any other covering than such as the ample dome of the cave itself offered. 

 In the central room of the main building we found a circular basin-like 

 depression (a), 30 inches across and 10 deep, that had served as a fire- 

 place, being still filled with the ashes and cinders of aboriginal fires, the 

 surrounding walls being blackened with smoke and soot. This room 

 was undoubtedly the kitchen of the house. Some of the smaller rooms 

 appear to have been used for the same purpose, the fires having been 

 made in the corner against the back wall, the smoke escaping overhead. 

 The masonry displayed in the construction of the walls is very credit- 

 able ; a symmetrical curve is preseved throughout the whole line, and 

 every portion perfectly plumb ; the subdivisions are at right angles to 

 the front. The stones employed are of the size used in all similar struct- 

 ures, and are roughly broken to a uniform size. More attention seems 

 to have been paid to securing a smooth appearance upon the exterior than 

 the interior surfaces, the clay cement being spread to a perfectly plane 

 surface, something like a modern stucco finish. In many places, of course, 

 this had peeled away, leaving the rough, ragged edges of the stones 

 exposed. On the inner walls of some of the subdivisions that appear to 

 have been less used than others, the impressions of the hands, and even 

 the delicate lines on the thumbs and fingers of the builders, were plainly 

 retained; in one or two cases a perfect mould of the whole inner surface 

 of the hand was imprinted in the plastic cement. They were considera- 

 bly smaller than our own hands, and were probably those of women 

 or children. In the mortar between the stones several corn-cobs were 

 found embedded, and in other places the whole ear of corn had been 

 pressed into the clay, leaving its impression ; the ears were quite small, 

 none more than 5 inches long. In the rubbish of the large house some 

 small stone implements, rough indented pottery in fragments, and a 

 few arrow-points were found. It is a wonder that anything is found, 

 for it is more than likely that every house has been ransacked time after 

 time by wandering bands of Utes and Navajos, who would search with 

 keen eyes for any articles of use or ornament left after the first spolia- 

 tion. The whole appearance of the place and its surroundings indicates 

 that the family or little community who inhabited it were in good cir- 

 cumstances and the lords of the surrounding country. Looking out from 

 one of their houses, with a great dome of solid rock overhead, that 

 echoed and re-echoed every word uttered with marvellous distinctness, 

 and below them a steep descent of 100 feet to the broad fertile valley 

 of the Eio Ban Juan, covered with waving fields of maize and scattered 

 groves of majestic cottonwoods, these old people, whom even the imagin- 



