CHAPTER III. 
Of the Indian Tribes. 
The Apaches .—This is by far the most numerous tribe of Indians in Hew Mexico, and ex¬ 
tends along both sides of the Rio Grande, from the southern limits of the Navajo country at 
the parallel of 34°, to the extreme southern line of the Territory, and from thence over the 
States of Chihuahua, Sonora, and Durango, of Mexico. Their range eastward is as far as the 
valley of the Pecos, and they are found as far to the west as the Pimos villages on the Gila. 
They are divided into numerous hands, each of which takes its name from the district of 
country in which it is most frequently found, and all of which are under the control of separate 
and independent chiefs. They are greatly the most difficult to control of the Indians of New 
Mexico, as they not only infest the entire southern portion of the Territory, hut carry their 
plundering forays as far south as the city of Durango itself. The valley of the Rio Grande 
helow the parallel of 33° 30' is midway between the haunts of the White Mountain or Mezca- 
lero and Copper Mine or Gila Apaches ; and in consequence, along the valley of the river, and 
along the route over the Jornada del Muerto, most of their depredations have been committed. 
They lie in wait along that portion of the route remote from settlements, for small parties and 
unprotected trains ; and having plundered both the men and the wagons, they retreat rapidly 
to the fastnesses of the mountains east and west of the river. Their country is nearly destitute 
of game—is little adapted to cultivation, even were the Indians disposed to till the soil, and no 
treaties nor inducements can for any length of time restrain their plundering expeditions into 
the settlements of New Mexico. These Indians are wholly different in their characteristics from 
any with whom we have been brought into contact in the valleys of the Mississippi or Missouri. 
They are much less intelligent and less bold than, and have none of the warlike tastes or accom¬ 
plishments of the Pawnee or the Sioux. Their sole object is plunder, and they are totally 
destitute of the ambition or the courage to distinguish themselves by warlike achievements. 
The principal aims of their greatest war expeditions have been directed to the plundering of 
small ranchos, and the driving off of herds of stock, and the murder of a miserable and help¬ 
less shepherd is matter of immense exultation. 
They carry off the children from these ravaged settlements, and either adopt them into the 
tribe or make slaves of them. 
In this habit they are closely imitated, or have been set the example, by the people of New 
Mexico, and it is very doubtful whether a settlement can be found in the valley of the Rio 
Grande not possessed of Indian slaves. These poor creatures are bought and sold like horses 
or mules, and it seems rather too much to expect that the Indians shall deliver up the Mexican 
prisoners in their possession to the authorities which countenance openly the sale and slavery 
of numbers of their tribe. So far as three years’ experience in the country has enabled me to 
judge, it has seemed to me that the amount of robbery is about equal between the lower classes 
of New Mexicans and the Indians, whose herds of stock are frequently together, and that 
protection from plunder, which we are expending so much money to secure the former, could 
with equal justice be extended to the Indian. 
It is difficult to say upon which side plundering predominates, although all depredations 
committed by the Indians, tenfold exaggerated, are duly laid before the authorities. 
Those tribes of Apaches which I have named, occupying the fastnesses of the mountains east 
and west, descend upon the valley of the Rio Grande as far to the north as the town of Socorro, 
