The Rock Island Argus and daily union. (Rock Island, Ill.) 1920-1923, 1920-08-26

Rito Do Los Frijolss. N. NJ. Aug
ss.-Long before Columbus cross
ed the Atlantic. and probably be-
fore Christ Was born, there was q
city In this barren canon.
It was city web worthy the
name, with many stone houses.
with churches and forts. arts and
industries, and farm lands to feed
its people, Of whom there were
perhaps two thousand.
The age Of this city is q matter
for speculation. 1t is known only
that 1t was q ruin when the Span
iards came in the 18th century.
There are many pther things about
1t that puzzle archaeologists. But
its size and how 1t looked are ap'
parent to every beholder. For hall
Of 1t was built Of masonry, some
of which still stands, and the 9th
er half was excavated in the face
of the tufa cliffs.
These rooms made by digging
are almost unchanged. The SCOT Of
ancient fires is still black on their
roofs, and on their floors lie the
stone mortars and pestles with
(which grain was ground, the stone
tools with which the rooms were
made, bits sof pottery, arrow heads
and many other remnants OF the
life that was.
For a long time writer's romano
ed about the men who made these
cliff dwellings. Because the doors
were low, so that a nah could en-
ter only on hands and knees, it wa:
assumed that they were a pigmy
race. But Bandelier. Loomis ant
other able investigators discreditet
this charming fairy tale. The!
showed that in all essentials, a!
shown by its remains. this civiliza
ton Of the cliff jewellers was lik'
the civilization Of the Pueblo In
dams Ut today. They established
the fact that the ancestors OF thu
Modern Pueblos lived IN this cliff
city in an age when they were
more thriving race than they hav'
been in historical times, and whel
| they needed such refuge in orde
to escape the Apaches and othe
nomad Indians.
i A Striking Site.
l Never was a city built in a NOR
picturesque and inaccessible loca
ton. Here the Rio Grande pillow
way a thousand feet deep through
; a barren land of lava, iron har'
and iron hot, frugally timbere'
with gnarled and hardy pinon an
juniper. Down to the river com
other streams-little clear stream
from the pointed peaks to the mort
!, through gorges as deep and shee
as that of the Rio Grande itsell
But these tributary canohs are no
cut through lava. Their walls TO
the most part are of tufa. a vol
canic deposit as soft and workabl
as chalk and yet solid as marble.
The Rito is one of these branc
canons. 1t is perhaps 700 feet deeK
and/its walls are SO abrupt tina
its floor can be reached only by
few steep and difficult trails.
You must picture it, then. as
vast crack in the face Of the earth
with walls steep and sheer. sculp
tured in all sorts of forms by win
and rain, and tinted in every shad
of brown, from the palest buff I
the richest OF old meerschaum
, These walls are barren and sterile
but at the bottom of the cano
there are temple-like groves c
, pine and thick shade Of willow an
box elder along the stream, an
, open level land where corn wi
/ grow. And the level mesas abov
are we'll timbered with pine an
, juniper and support rich gras
Wild turkey and blacktail deer ar
still abundant there. as they mus
have been in the days Of the eli
jewellers. There are bear in tn
canons and mountain lions an
coyotes are abundant.
1t is easy to imagine the char
which such a spot would have fc
a tribe Of primitive men, sedentar
by habit. who longed for a plae
where they would be secure frol
,plundering bands Of nomad Ii
dams. They could raise corn
the canons and perhaps on tt
mesas; game was abundant; II
r winters were mild. and the tut
cliffs made the building Of HON.
e an easy matter. No doubt IL
n rooms in the cliff walls were mac
4 first with rude stone picks. tt
1 doors we're made small so that
n single round boulder would clio.
one against a marauder. Window