vide to
make the ford at the little stream.

The monthly stages started from each end of the route at the same time;
later the service was increased to once a week; after a while to three
times, until in the early '60's daily stages were run from both ends of
the route, and this was continued until the advent of the railroad.

Each coach carried eleven passengers, nine closely stowed inside--three
on a seat--and two on the outside on the boot with the driver. The fare
to Santa Fe was two hundred and fifty dollars, the allowance of baggage
being limited to forty pounds; all in excess of that cost half a dollar
a pound. In this now seemingly large sum was included the board of the
travellers, but they were not catered to in any extravagant manner;
hardtack, bacon, and coffee usually exhausted the menu, save that at
times there was an abundance of antelope and buffalo.

There was always something exciting in those journeys from the Missouri
to the mountains in the lumbering Concord coach. There was the constant
fear of meeting the wily red man, who persistently hankered after
the white man's hair. Then there was the playfulness of the sometimes
drunken driver, who loved to upset his tenderfoot travellers in some
arroya, long after the moon had sunk below the horizon.

It required about two weeks to make the trip from the Missouri River to
Santa Fe, unless high water or a fight with the Indians made it several
days longer. The animals were changed every twenty miles at first, but
later, every ten, when faster time was made. What sleep was taken could
only be had while sitting bolt upright, because there was no laying
over; the stage continued on night and day until Santa Fe was reached.

After a few years, the company built stations at intervals varying
from ten miles to fifty or more; and there the animals and drivers
were changed, and meals furnished to travellers, which were always
substantial, but never elegant in variety or cleanliness.

Who can ever forget those meals at the "stations," of which you were
obliged to partake or go hungry: biscuit hard enough to serve as
"round-shot," and a vile decoction called, through courtesy, coffee--but
God help the man who disputed it!

Some stations, however, were notable exceptions, particularly in the
mountains of New Mexico, where, aside from the bread--usually only
tortillas, made of the blue-flint corn of the country--and coffee
composed of the saints may know what, t