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.

58 PRIMITIVE CUSTOMS OF THE PEOPLE.
raised to supply the immediate wants of the people, as its
great distance from any market precludes the possibility of
exportation.
Could a person familiar with Bible history be suddenly
transported and set down in the Mesilla Valley, he would certainly imagine himself among the Children of Israel, so primitive are the habits and customs of the people. They use as a
plough a sharpened stick of wood fastened to a beam, which
beam is tied to the horns of the cattle by thongs of rawhide,
serving the purpose of a yoke. No iron ever enters into
the construction of their carts; they are made entirely of
wood and rawhide, the wheels being sections of the stump
of a tree. It has often occurred to me, when I have heard
one of these lumbering old carts creaking along the road,
that the genius who invented the steam-whistle must have
obtained his first idea from the noise made by their wheels.
The houses are built of sun-dried brick - adobes - or
else after the style described by Father Kino, when they are
called jacals. All the grain is threshed in the field, by
driving oxen over it; "nor do they muzzle the ox that
tieadeth out the corn."
It is rarely that a chair or table is seen in a Mexican house.
The people eat, sitting upon the floor, and fingers take the
place of knives and forks. Their food generally consists of
tortillas unleavened bread, chill - red pepper, frejolies --
or beans, and garlic.
.