Arizona citizen., 1879-01-18
MESHLA TO TRINIDAD.
Stage Time and Connections RaIgay in Eaton NouHtai1s-Road Agents Att1ck StGge-Trinidad
 Mdtters.


 2S at s a. m. and arrived here at 10 D
 m yeSterday-but should have got hero
 at 6 and would have but for unusually P heavy snow between Las Vegas and
 here Train leaves this morning al g
 o'clock, making me just ten days from
 Tucson. Had l connected close al
 Mesilla. the lime would have been
 eight days from Tucson to leaving by
 train here, and actual travelling time
 seven. There is a lie-over al Santa Fe
 of ten hours and here of thirteen.
 when stage makes exact time on all v divisions. Rev. c. A. Poage left Tue.
 son December 9, and took the train
 here this morning, but he was enter
 prising enough to employ team al
 Silver City and overtake the coach
 which left that town less than an hour
 before his arrival Had he not done
 so, he would have been twelve full days on the road. l observed more promise of close connection than per
 tormance; but it is just 10 say that
 believe from what 1 saw and heard,
 that close connections will be made
 at all points by or before February
 Even then no one must expect to reach
 the train here in less than eight full
 days from Tucson. Rapid time Is
 made on the stages over all divisions, and especially from Santa Fe here
 The coaches are comfortable and iheI eating very fair on the average There will be a freight and passenger station established, by February 1, at Clifton
 in Red River Valley, on the south sideI ! of the RalOn mountaiIs-Gistant from here twenty-eight miles The grading ! is done and ties and rails laid 10 wijh-I in six miles of that point and a large force of men at work. Construction trains run to the front aud pass over the mountain summit by what are called back-swijches, that is the track is laid zigzag like a mountain D ck-lraii, forming acute angles al the turns, and the turns are made by switches. The whole distance now
 made by these -' switch. backs is three
 miles. This method of crossing wllli be continued until the summit tunnel of nearly 22J0 feet is completed This work i5 now prosecuted from four faces-two from either side of the mountain and two from a central shaft
 To see the locomotive running in the Raton mountains reminds one of the same sight in TehachePe Pass or uear Donuer Lake. The approach to the summit from the east, Is quite similar to the ascent of Tehachepe canyon. : The scenery passing through the Raton | mountains Is not strIkiuglY grand to. $ a person familiar with travel by rail in the Alleghany and Sierra Nevada mountains, but Is next to the best in tAe' United States out of those mountains, and about all that lhe passenger will see of special interest between the Mission river and Fl Paso
 Forty miles north of Mesilla, al Point of Rocks on the Jornada, our stage was attacked by three masked on the 27th of December, at D. m The driver, Bill Reed, re- fused to obey the command of halt" given several times in quick success sion. For this disobedience, the .. agents" began firing into tEe team and coach Not less that twenty five
 sh,ts were fired One mule vas se- verely wounded in the jaw but was ' able 10 go to the next station. The harness of two mules was cut by balls ', and one passed directly through the coach. IL missed my head about an VI inch to my right, and had not Mr. 1 Poage been lnclining his head to one II side at the time, It would have entered ' his forehead near if not exactly be-
 tween the eyes. Col. W. L. Rynerson '' of Las Cruces, well known to a mum
 Der of people in Tucson, was d pas o, ,enger. and he, too, violated Ihe rules Q in such cases, and took deliberate aim sl and fired with his Remington, and weI n, nave hopes that his ball hiJ an agent" |, Or he staggered back at the moment a ,f firing. For while the pop" pop" of the shooting was decidedly ,, unpleasant 10 all hands, but we all ,I escaped without a scratch and without -, oss; yet I would much rather have ~, ,iven these knights of the road the . liver watch and $lO I had in cash, .'. han to have listened to their shooting, in which way the guns were " ,olnted and their purposes. ,o The weather has been piercingly ii, old from Santa F6 uorihward. Some ;n f the stage drivers suffered acu,ely. ,o 'hey say no such weather has prevail
 d for many years, and old settlers say
 he same The news comes here of fa rams blockaded east and north. No c, rain has reached here via the Denver so 2 Rio Granie for three days. Bl This is a thriving town of 2500 in- tn abitants. Many buildings are going it D and many of them have two and bii
 ,o,,o ,rJ brici- fr,,,s ,r,