Lippincotts Magazine of Popular Literature and Science | Page 2

which are many legends of
absorbing interest. All their traditions point to Montezuma as the
founder and leader of their race, and likewise to their descent from the
Aztecs. But their glory departed with the coming of Cortez, and their
Spanish conquerors treated them as an inferior race. Revolting against
their oppressors in 1680, they were reconquered thirteen years later,
though subsequently allowed greater liberty. By the treaty of
Guadalupe-Hidalgo in 1848 they became citizens of the United States.
From one extreme of government to another has drifted this remnant of

a stately race, till now at last it finds itself safely sheltered in the arms
of our great republic.
Such is the romantic history of a portion of our so-called "New West;"
but it was with a view of ascertaining some facts concerning
occurrences of more recent date, as well as of seeing some of the actors
therein, that we paid a visit to Pueblo. We found it a rather odd mixture
of the old and the new, the adobe and the "dug-out" looking across the
street upon the imposing structure of brick or the often gaudily-painted
frame cottage. It looked as though it might have been indulging in a
Rip Van Winkle sleep, except that the duration might have been a
century or two. High mesas with gracefully rounded and convoluted
sides almost entirely surround it, and rising above their floor-like tops,
and in fine contrast with their sombre brown tints, appear the blue
outlines of the distant mountains. Pike's Peak, fifty miles to the north,
and the Spanish Peaks, the Wawatoyas, ninety to the south, are sublime
objects of which the eye never grows weary; while the Sierra Mojadas
bank up the western horizon with a frowning mountain-wall. A notch in
the distant range, forty miles to the north-west, indicates the place
where the Arkansas River breaks through the barriers that would
impede its seaward course, forming perhaps the grandest cañon to be
found in all this mighty mountain-wilderness. Truly a striking picture
was that on which Coronado and his mail-clad warriors gazed.
[Illustration: GENERAL VIEW OF PUEBLO, COLORADO,
LOOKING NORTH-WEST--PIKE'S PEAK IN THE DISTANCE.]
A motley throng compose the inhabitants of Pueblo. The dark-hued
Mexican, his round face shaded by the inevitable sombrero, figures
conspicuously. But if you value his favor and your future peace of
mind have a care how you allude to his nationality. He is a Spaniard,
you should know--a pure Castilian whose ancestor was some old
hidalgo with as long an array of names and titles as has the Czar of All
the Russias himself. Though he now lives in a forsaken-looking adobe
hut with dirt floor and roof of sticks and turf that serves only to defile
the raindrops that trickle through its many gaps--though his sallow wife
and ill-favored children huddle round him or cook the scanty meal
upon the mud oven in a corner of the room--he is yet a Spaniard, and
glories in it. The tall, raw-boned man, straight as a young cottonwood,
whose long black hair floats out from beneath his hat as he rides into

town from his ranch down the river, may be a half-breed who has
figured in a score of Indian fights, and enjoys the proud distinction of
having killed his man. There is the hungry-looking prospector, waiting
with ill-disguised impatience till he can "cross the Range" and follow
again, as he has done year after year, the exciting chase after the
ever-receding mirage--the visions of fabulous wealth always going to
be, but never quite, attained. The time-honored symbol of Hope must,
we think, give place to a more forcible representation furnished by the
peculiar genius of our times; for is not our modern Rocky-Mountain
prospector the complete embodiment of that sublime grace? His is a
hope that even reverses the proverb, for no amount of deferring is able
to make him heartsick, but rather seems to spur him on to more earnest
endeavor. Has he toiled the summer long, endured every privation,
encountered inconceivable perils, only to find himself at its close
poorer than when he began? Reluctantly he leaves the mountain-side
where the drifting snows have begun to gather, but seemingly as
light-hearted as when he came, for his unshaken hope bridges the
winter and feeds upon the limitless possibilities of the future. Full of
wonderful stories are these same hope-sustained prospectors--tales that
are bright with the glitter of silver and gold. Not a single one of them
who has not discovered "leads" of wonderful richness or "placers"
where the sands were yellow with gold; but by some mischance the
prize always slipped out of his grasp, and left him poor in all but hope.
And in truth so fascinating becomes the occupation that men who in
other respects seem cool and phlegmatic