VOL. XXVIII. No. 5. ) 
WHOLE No. 1227. ) 
NEW YORK, AND ROCHESTER, N. Y, AIR 
( PRICE SIX CENTS S', 
1 *2.50 PER YEAR. 
[Entered according to Act of Congress, In the year IS73, by D. D. T. Moore, in the office of the Librarian of Congress, at Washington.J 
jogging along through the country with their 
toes almost touching I he ground, chatting 
and smoking, and swinging their Tent about 
like the pendulum of a cheap Yankee clock. 
They have no bridle or reins, but guide the 
Boom, as the donkeys are railed, with a 
cudgel by touching him on the think or fore 
shoulder. The rider, if but one is Upon Inin, 
invariably takes his position over the hind 
legs as near the tail as possible. It is less 
work to ride one in this position, and of all 
the multitudinous duties of man they shun 
this one the most. If many of them would 
study half as hard to do the work as they do 
to get rid of it, the work would he done with 
less actual labor. 
The duties of the men, as a general rule, 
seem to be to hang around the house and 
see the women work. If the outside of the 
house needs whitewashing, the women do it, 
smoothing it over in many cases with their 
hands, both inside and out. The floor in 
nearly every habitation is of earth, patted 
down and smoothed with the hand of the 
housewife, while the lord of the manor quiet¬ 
ly looks on, fully appreciating the situation, 
smoking and philosophizing over the good 
day’s work of his better-half. The men nearly 
always build the house—that is, put up the 
walls and roof it in—while the women finish 
the walls and make the furniture. The 
buildings are made of adobes, or sun-dried 
brick ; said brick are about a foot wide by 
eighteen inches long and three inches thick, 
a little cut straw in their composition. The 
buildings are but one story high, covered with 
earth ; the walls of the house rest on a rough 
stone foundation, which is made by excavat¬ 
ing a trench and throwing in t he rock work 
in as careless a manner and with as little 
work as the circumstances will permit. This 
prevents the water, during the rainy season, 
from undermining the structure. The walls 
are lniilt from eight to twelve feet high; 
then logs are thrown across (the pilch of 
the roof is about inch to the foot); over 
these are laid brush, and in the more aristo¬ 
cratic dwellings little sticks with the bark 
peeled off, then straw laid over these and the 
whole covered with earth about one foot in 
thickness, being well wet and thoroughly 
mixed u,» before plastering it on; when this 
becomes dry, it takes a long time before 
water can penetrate through it. These mud 
dwellings, in neatness and order, many of 
them, would put to shame a great many of 
their Northern neighbors, wfio have ponses 
built after the most approved fashion. 
Their beds are always clean; the mattress¬ 
es or eolchoons are home-made. They are 
usually about six inches thick, fiUeil with 
wool, and form a very cool, springy resting 
place. Very few psople use bedsteads, but 
Spread the mattresses on the earth floor. 
During the day they are folded and placed 
against the wall, forming a row of couches 
around the room, and these are always cov¬ 
ered with calico, hanging in little, graceful 
curtains down to the floor. These form nearly 
all of the scats of the establishment, ; chairs 
arc. at a discount, although in nearly every 
house will be found a few chairs of curious 
and sometimes neat construction. 
In this country, to sum it up. the women 
are industrious and neat; the men are glad 
of it. Everybody smokes. They chain up 
their hogs and let their dogs run loose. 
A. J. itUKSELr,. 
SKETCHES IN NEW MEXICO.-III 
THE PET OF THE FAMILY. 
Thu Donkey in New Mexico is made one 
of the most, useful (if not ornamental) ani¬ 
mals of the household. Owing to their cheap¬ 
ness, nearly every family possesses one, and 
they are used for everything—carrying wood 
and water, bringing in the grain and vegeta¬ 
bles, carrying rhe wool and everything else 
to market and in fact they are a Jack-of-aU- 
trades. One carries sometimes two and three 
men on its back at a time. There seems to 
be nothing vicious about them, and they are 
often seen standing with their heads in the 
door of the house while the family duties are 
going forward; and the children always enjoy 
their presence, climbing on the back by the 
score almost; and poor Jack Rays never a 
word but wags his great ears forward and 
back anfLseems to enjoy it as well as the 
children. It is amusing to see two great, 
trapping men on one of those little fellows 
BalphEvans ftgt 
