338 CARRIZAL. Book II. 
legs, long neck, and long bill, called by the Mexicans 
Gallareda. They flew, when disturbed, in wedge-shaped 
flocks, with outstretched necks like geese. The spring and 
the piece of water are called Ojo de la Laguna. The 
water is slightly alkalic, and a white efflorescence collects 
at its edge. 
On the morning of the 17th we arrived at Carrizal, an 
important but now ruinous village, formerly a pre- 
sidio or military post for the protection of the country 
against the Apaches. These foes of all civilized existence 
have a Rancheria in one of the neighbouring mountain 
chains. The locality of their fastness was pointed out to 
me from the houses in Carrizal, and the robbers can, at all 
times, from their rocky pinnacles watch the remnant of 
the numerous herds of cattle which must inevitably become 
their prey. The inhabitants, as in all North Mexican 
localities, are literally the shepherds to the Apaches; 
not indeed willing ones, for every man carried his gun. 
Such constant warfare has made the inhabitants of Carrizal 
itself wild and brutal, so that the traveller had better be on 
his guard against them. 
The situation of this place is one of the most beautiful 
on the North Mexican table-land. An extensive plain, 
watered by several streams, is surrounded in the distance 
by a girdle of bare, steep mountains. A clear mountain 
stream, dispensing fertility to field and meadow in its 
course, flows through canals between raised banks, for miles 
through the plain, its course marked by long rows of 
poplars. Twenty years since, herds of many hundred 
thousands of cattle grazed upon this plain. Now they 
have dwindled down to the mere shadow of their former 
number ; and, comparing the present state of this locality 
with the wealth it was known formerly to possess, the 
