The marvellous country, or, Three years in Arizona and New Mexico.: Containing an authentic history of this wonderful country and its ancient civilization ... together with a full and complete history of the Apache tribe of Indians .../ By Samuel Woodworth Cozzens. Illustrated by more than one hundred engravings.

SATISFIED CURIOSITY.
that upon reflection I became satisfied that Charles Sprague
was entirely wrong when he said in his beautiful poem on
"Curiosity," that "it came from Heaven." I didn't believe it that night, and I doubt if I do nlow. Then, I should
not have hesitated a moment to declare my conviction that it
originated in a place supposed to be the antipodes of heaven.
The next morning, after partaking of a brealkast of pemmican,* I strolled out into the village, hoping that the
season of dances was over.
Had I then known that not two years before, this same
band of Apaches, in this very ranchera, had sacrificed a
young Mexican girl, it would in no way have served to
quiet my apprehensions. She was offered as a sacrifice to
propitiate the Great Spirit, whose wrath had manifested
itself by visiting upon them the small-pox.
After fattening her for several months, keeping her very
quiet, and in ignorance of her fate, they brought her, on
the morning when the sacrifice was to be made, to the
place of torture. Here, placing her between two trees, they
suspended her by ropes tied around her wrists, so that her
feet, which were firmly fastened together, were about three
* The flesh of buffalo or deer, dried until it becomes hard and brittle, and
then pounded fine, and put into bags made of buffalo hide or deer-skin, the
tallow being melted and poured over it, and the whole mass pressed together,
when it soon becomes as hard as a stone. This is a favorite and convenient
method of carrying meat where game is scarce in the Apache Country.
125