392 INCIDENTS AT 
pute. The town of Cruces is about three, and Dofia Ana 
about eleven miles further up the valley. The bottom- 
lands are exceedingly fertile on both banks of the 
river; and I am not aware that they are better situ- 
ated or more productive on one bank than on the 
other. The barracks at Fort Fillmore are as yet 
quite rude, being mere jackals, that is, built of upright 
sticks filled in with mud. They were hastily put up; 
but it is the intention of Colonel Miles to have more 
substantial buildings of adobe erected forthwith. There 
is no better material in this country for buildings than 
this. 
I took the opportunity while at Fort Fillmore to 
visit a silver mine, which had been discovered a few 
months previous, and which was now being worked by 
its owner, Hugh Stevenson, Hsq., of El Paso. The mine 
is situated in the Organ Mountains, about eighteen 
miles east of the Fort; and as these mountains are the 
haunts of the Apaches, Colonel Miles kindly furnished 
us with an escort of ten dragoons, commanded by Major 
Steen, an officer familiar with this nega, and expe- 
rienced in Indian campaigns. 
By taking an early start we reached the nearest 
point in the mountains, about twelve miles distant, 
before 10 o’clock, having traversed a desert plain with 
a gradual ascent the whole way. On reaching a defile 
which leads across the ridge. Major Steen and Dr. 
Webb took a portion of the dragoons and went to the 
time some mischievous persons put the idea into their heads of saving 
their property by denying the jurisdiction of Mexico ; and this is doubt- 
less the foundation of the statement that they desire to be annexed to 
the United States. 
