PUEBLO ACOMA.

Star (Christchurch), Issue 11153, 11 August 1914, Page 4

PUEBLO ACOMA.

QUAINTEST SPOT IN UNITED STATE.

(" Buffalo Express.")

Ask any western traveller to point out the most picturesque spot in the United States. Without hesitation, ha will turn to the map of New Mexico, and put his finger on the spot representing the pueblo of Acoma. s " There is no more weird and strange place in the world than A coma," said a sunburnt traveller who hunts the out-of-the-way places in the south-west. In the first place, hardly any tourists are ever seen there. It la off the beateD trail, and, though only halt a day'* journey from the pueblo of which is on a transcontiue'iilol rf»v Acoma is as remote from civilisatioi as it was when discovered three hundred years ago- " I suppose not oyer a dozen whit« men call at Acoma in the course of a year. It is a hard trip there, across the hot ideserfc, and the Acomans, who belong to the Queres tribe, are none too hospitable to the stranger within the gates. Unless you have a pull with the gobernador or Governor and general pooh-bah of the pueblo,'yon might as well make up your mind to say good-bye just as soon as you have said hello, because you'l 1 be given to understand, and very plumly, that you are not wanted.

" It isn't any special unfriendliness on the part of tho Acomans, for they are just as progressive as any of the south-ivest Indians, and there are many educated members of the tribe; but they simply PREFER TO BE LEFT ALONE and figure tßat they have worried along pretty well without white assistance for several hundred years, and will he able to do, so for several hundred years more. " These are the very thing"; that make Acoma a delight to the discriminating traveller, who has .secured the necessary pull and who is made welcome by the gobernador and his satellites. It is all so primitive and unlike anything else, this .quiet place in the bright New Mexican sunshine, in a picturesque setting. "As you approach the mesa, you understand how easy it would <be for the Acomans to defend themselves against any lttack that might be mado upon them. The main trail is plainly defined. It winds across the desert and brings you up against the ba-e of the between a couple of big groups of sandstone two hundred feet high guarding the pass like giants. Tho trail slipes upward from theso giants, and mules and horses can make the ascent to the top. There are two other trails, but they aie for foot purposes Unless one has a clear head, and is a good climber, he doesn't want to tackle either one of them, as the paths aro cut in solid rock, and m some places are merely

FOOTHOLES IN THE SIDE OF THE PRECIPICE.

" The town itself, when once, you have reaqhed the top of the mesa* is something never ,to be is built after the style of most pueblo villages, all the houses beiiig of adobe. Some of them are three - stories,, in height, the upper floors .being .reached by the ladders-which are always leaning against the walls and which add such a picturesque effect to every pueblo. There are three long, rows of buildings, with 10 large communal houses. The streets and alleys are narrow, and when looking down them one always gets the wonderful effectof distance—for the vision leaps right off-the edge of the mesa and cut on to the plain, no matter which way you look. Some of the house 3 are built on the edge of the. cliff. As nearly all the Aconjans sleep on the roof, especially during the summer months, it is g wonder thiit some of them do not roll off or step off when walking in their sleep and dash themselves to pieces 300 feet below. When, the stranger wakes up in the morning, after his nap on the roof of one of the dwellings. and finds himself on • r erge of such a descent, he is apt to plead for sleeping quarters that are less airy. . ' "The people have _ irrigated tracts of the plains below, "and are skillful farmers. They are moderately industrious, and in the morning

A CRIER MAKES THE.ROUND of the pueblo calling on all the illhabitants to rise and go forth, to labour- Another crier announces the time for meals, and at bedtime the criers make their last round and ail . quiet. " There is an old church at Acotna that has seen strenuous times. It is situatod on the solith-east corner of the mesa, apart from the town. It is 40 feet high and 15u feet long and the adobe walls that compose it are seven feet thick. There is an abandoned convent near it. This cliurch was built by the Spaniards, who conquered Acoma in the clays of the Conquxtadores. Goronada stormed tl;a mesa and captured the town in 1-541. The people made a desperate de£'-fico> \ but it was not so easy to stop the mailed Spaniards from coming up the slopes as it would have been hod the assailants been the poorly armed Apaches or N ivajos. the hereditary enemies of the Acomans. In -3598, after the people of Acoma had rebelled against Spanish rule, they wero defeated again, this time by Juan da Onate, but 10 years later rebelled again and murdered the priests and partially destroyed the church and, since then thero has been no trouble. THE ENCHANTED MESA.

'"A short distance away from thw pneblo of Acoma is the wonderful .Mesa Encantada, or Enchanted Mesa. This mesa is even larger than the one on which Acoma is looated, and there is no trail to the top. Legend says that the one trail was destroyed by ft lightning bolt hundreds of years ago. At that time it is said there was a town on the Enchanted Mesa. Most of the inhabitants were away in tho fields when the trail was destroyed, but a few were left on stop of th<» mesa, where they starved- The survivors moved to the other mess and built the town of Acoma, and to-day the Enchanted Mesa is shunned_ l<y the Acomans- as if evil spirits lived hero."