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.

8HROUDED I YSTE
SHROUDED IN MYSTERIY.
The plains are everywhere strewn with broken pottery
and metattes. The pottery is red, white, lead color, and
black. The figures are geometrical, formed with taste, and
are similar to those found on the Salinas, forty miles north
of this place.
The texture of the pottery is very fine, and much of it is
painted on the inside, a peculiarity found only here. The
origin of these buildings is shrouded in mystery. When
first discovered by the early explorers of the Territory, they
were much the same as in their present condition; and the
Indians affirmed that they had then been built five hundred
years.
One thing is evident, viz. the entire valley of the Gila,
as well as that of the Salinas, was at one time densely pope
ulated. The ruined buildings, the acequias, the quantities
of pottery found, all prove this supposition. In fact, the
whole country for hundreds of miles around shows traces
of extinct civilization, and fills the mind of the traveller
with the most perplexing questions.
What race of people dwelt here? By whom were these
decaying walls erected? Who constructed the many thousand miles of acequias? How did they live, and where are
they now? are questions that suggest themselves at every
step; and as yet they have never been satisfactorily
answered.
It seems to me that our government ought to take some
194