its lurking flames, amidst the hot smoke, they still
battled fierce, and foaming, and frenzied.

I did not stay to recognise whom they were, these tireless combatants.
I ran forward, looking on all sides for the objects of my solicitude.
The wave of female dresses caught my eye, far up the cliff, on the road
leading to the Navajo captives. It was they! The three were climbing
the steep path, each urged onward by a savage.

My first impulse was to rush after; but at that moment fifty horsemen
made their appearance upon the hill, and came galloping downward.

I saw the madness of attempting to follow them, and turned to retreat
towards the other side, where we had left our captives and horses. As I
ran across the bottom, shots rang in my ear, proceeding from our side of
the barranca. Looking up, I descried the mounted hunters coming down at
a gallop, pursued by a cloud of savage horsemen. It was the band of
Dacoma!

Uncertain what to do, I stood for a moment where I was, and watched the
pursuit.

The hunters, on reaching the ranches, did not halt, but galloped on down
the valley, firing as they went. A body of Indians swept on after them,
while another body pulled up, clustered around the blazing ruin, and
commenced searching among the walls.

I was yet screened in the thicket of cacti; but I saw that my
hiding-place would soon be pierced by the eyes of the subtle savages;
and dropping upon my hands and knees, I crept into the cliff. On
reaching it, I found myself close to the mouth of a cave, a small shaft
of the mine, and into this I at once betook myself.

CHAPTER FORTY SEVEN.

A QUEER ENCOUNTER IN A CAVE.

The place into which I had crawled was of irregular outlines. Rocks
jutted along the sides, and between these, small lateral shafts had been
dug, where the miners had followed the ramifications of the "quixa."
The cave was not a deep one; the vein had not proved profitable, and had
been abandoned for some other.

I kept up it till I was fairly "in the dark"; and then groping against
one side, I found a recess, in which I ensconced myself. By peeping
round the rock, I could see out of the cave and some distance over the
bottom of the barranca, where the bushes grew thin and straggling.

I had hardly seated myself when my attention was called to a scene that
was passing outside. Two men on their hands and knees were crawling
through the cactus plants in front of the cave. Beyond them half