y village, still
it has its plaza and its alameda, in the former of which a military band
performs two evenings in each week. A couple of small but most valuable
rivers, the Rio Conchos and the Rio Florido, flank the town and afford
excellent means for irrigation, which are improved to the utmost, the
effects of which are clearly visible to the most casual observer, in the
delightful verdure and the promise of teeming crops. The place has a
most equable climate, for which reason many northern invalids suffering
from pulmonary troubles have come hither annually. A few miles west of
Santa Rosalia are mineral springs believed to possess great curative
properties, especially in diseases of a rheumatic type. There are yet no
comfortable accommodations for invalids, but we were told that it was
contemplated to build a moderate cost hotel at this point. The ruins of
the fort captured by the American army on its way to join General Taylor
are seen near Santa Rosalia.

Still pursuing our northward course, bearing a little westerly, over an
immense desert tract so devoid of water that the railway train is
obliged to transport large cisterns on freight cars to supply the
necessary article for the use of its locomotive, we finally reach
Chihuahua,--pronounced Chee-waw-waw,--capital of the state of the same
name. One would think this immediate region must be well watered, as we
cross several rivers while in the state. Among them the Florido, at
Jimenez; the Concho, just north of Santa Rosalia; the San Pedro, at
Ortiz, and the Chubisca, near to the city of Chihuahua. This name is
aboriginal, and signifies "The place where things are made." It was
founded in 1539, and lies upon a wide, open plain at the base of the
Sierra Madre, whose undulating heights are exquisitely outlined in
various hues against the sky, and beneath whose surfaces are hidden rich
veins of iron, copper, and silver. The valley extends towards the north
as far as the eye can reach. It is looking southward that we see the
disordered ranks of the mountain range. When we first came upon the
town, it rested beneath a cloudless sky, bathed in a flood of warm,
bright sunlight. We were told that these are the prevailing conditions
for seven months of the year. This is on the main line of the Mexican
Central Railroad, a thousand miles, more or less, north of the city of
Mexico, and has a population of about eighteen or twenty thousand; but,
like most of the Mexican cities,