[49] The Rio Pecus is the largest branch of the Rio Grande. Rising in the Santa Fé mountains immediately east of Santa Fé, and following a south-southeast course for about eight hundred miles, it enters the Rio Grande in latitude 29° 41′. The name is derived from an old pueblo, situated on one of the mountain tributaries about twenty-five miles southeast of Santa Fé. In 1540 this was the largest Indian village in New Mexico, containing a population of about two thousand souls; but the United States troops in 1846 found it desolate and in ruins. A small modern village has grown up near the ancient site.—Ed.
[50] This small town, presumably to the east of Santa Fé, cannot be the well-known San Juan, on the Rio del Norte opposite the mouth of the Chama River and about thirty miles north of Santa Fé. This latter San Juan was made the capital of New Mexico by Oñate in 1598-99, and so remained until the founding of Santa Fé.—Ed.
[51] "The Gila was known to the whites before the Mississippi was discovered; it was long better known than the Rio Grande and down to the present century was far better known than the Rio Colorado."—(Coues, Expeditions of Zebulon M. Pike, ii, p. 374.) The first name, Rio del Nombre de Jesus, was given to it by Oñate in 1604; the present name dates from 1697. The stream heads in the mountains of western New Mexico, and traversing Arizona empties into the Colorado at Fort Yuma (32° 43′ north latitude). See post, [notes 54], [63.]—Ed.
[52] This name, meaning succor, was given by Oñate to the Indian pueblo of Teipana, about eighty miles south of Albuquerque, because of the supplies of maize furnished by the inhabitants on his expedition up the Rio del Norte (1598-99). The old pueblo was destroyed in 1681, and the modern town founded in 1817. It is now the seat of Socorro County, and contains over 1,500 inhabitants. The home of the Spanish ex-governor and his daughter must have been in the neighborhood of the present city of Albuquerque, the largest town in New Mexico. Pattie's course quite closely followed the line of the Santa Fé railroad.—Ed.
[53] The mines were the well-known "Santa Rita de Cobre," in the western angle of the Sierra de Mogoyon, near the headwaters of the Gila and about one hundred miles west of the Rio del Norte. Mexicans began to work them in 1804. They proved very profitable (see post, [p. 350]), although the difficulty of obtaining supplies was great, owing to the plundering Apache. In 1838 these Indians entirely cut off the supply trains, and the mines were abandoned. They were for a time (1851) the headquarters of the boundary commission for the United States and Mexico. See Bartlett, Personal Narrative of Explorations (New York, 1854), i, pp. 226-239. Mining was resumed in 1873; the property is now operated by the Santa Rita Company, and is among the best equipped mines in the territory.—Ed.
[54] The present name of this stream, one of the initial forks of the Gila. The confluence is in Arizona, a few miles over the New Mexican border.—Ed.
[55] The Rocky Mountain sheep (Ovis montana) was well described by Lewis and Clark.—Ed.
[56] There are at least three varieties of mesquit-tree (prosopis) in New Mexico and Arizona. It is related to the acacia and locust; and the fruit, consisting of ten or twelve beans in a sweet, pulpy pod, is gathered by the Indians, pounded in a mortar, and made into bread. A prolific tree will yield ten bushels of beans in the hull. The Comanche also concoct an intoxicating drink from this bean.—Ed.
[57] The maguey is the American aloe (Agave americana). The Mexicans and Indians cut off the leaves near the root, leaving a head the size of a large cabbage. The heads are placed in the ground, overlaid with earth, and for a day a fire is kept burning on top of them; they are then eaten, tasting something like a beet. The roasted heads are also placed in a bag made of hides, and allowed to ferment, producing the liquor known as "mescal."—Ed.
[58] For the method of making a "cache," see Thwaites, Original Journals of the Lewis and Clark Expedition, index.—Ed.