TARAHUMARI INDIANS. 
203 
It takes six or seven hours of fairly 
continuous climbing to make, by mule- 
back, from the mine in a deep gulch to 
the “ cumbra,” or crest of the Barranca 
del Cobre, by a most difficult mountain 
trail, the ascent made being five thousand 
to six thousand feet. It takes four hours 
to descend in the same way. A message 
was sent from “la cumbra” by a Tara- 
humari foot runner to a person at the 
mine and an answer received in an hour 
and twenty minutes, the same messenger 
carrying the letter both ways, or making 
the round trip. 
One day a Tarahumari carrier passed us 
just after we had gone into camp about 
three o’clock in the afternoon, bound for 
the same point we expected to reach in 
three days’ hard travel by mule-back. I 
wanted to send a message by him to this 
