On the southwestern corner of the Galisteo Basin a broad channel discharges its waters into it, passing between the San Francisco range and the mountains of Dolores.  The channel is arid.  Mountain torrents rush through it only in the season of thunderstorms, and they have burrowed and ploughed through its surface, scarring it with deep furrows and shifting waterfalls.  Near the mouth of the pass and at no great distance from the plain, one of these arroyos has cut through an ancient village, exposing on both banks the lower walls and rooms of its buildings, visible on the surface only as irregular lines and quadrangles of rubbish.  The village must have been quite large for an Indian settlement, since seven rectangles with wing-like additions can still be traced.  This village in ruins is called to-day the Pueblo Largo, and the name is not inappropriate.

At the time of which we speak, the Pueblo Largo was inhabited, and in as high a state of prosperity as Indian pueblos ever attain unto.  It contained, as the ruins attest, nearly fifteen hundred people of the Tanos tribe.  Its name was Hishi.  The name is well known to-day to the remnants of the Tanos, for they have piously preserved the recollections of their former abodes.

Hishi is not on a beautiful site.  It lies in a wide ditch rather than in a valley.  No view opens from it, and sombre mountains loom up in close proximity both to the north and west.  In the rear of the village, the soil rises gradually to a low series of ridges, from the top of which, at some distance from Hishi, the eye ranges far off toward the plains and the basin of the salt lakes.  These ridges are convenient posts of observation.  Scouts placed there can descry the approach of hostile Apaches.  The latter roam up and down the plains, following the immense herds of buffalo, and prey upon the village Indians whenever the latter present any opportunity for a successful surprise.

The buffalo himself not infrequently comes to graze within a short distance of Hishi.  South of the present ruins lies the buffalo spring.  When the dark masses of this greatest of American quadrupeds are descried from the heights above the village, the Tanos go out with bow and arrow; and woe to the straggling steer or calf that lags behind.  Like the wolf, the Indian rarely attacked any but isolated animals.  Only when a communal hunt was organized, and a whole village sallied forth to make war upon the mighty king of the prairies,—­only then, previous to the introduction of fire-arms, could the redman venture to assault even a small herd or the rear-guard of a numerous column.

September is drawing to a close, and the autumnal sky is as cloudless and as pure over Hishi as it is over most of the other portions of New Mexico.  But in the hollow where the village is situated the sun is scorching, as Hishi lies much lower than the “corner in the east” and lower than the Rito.  The chaparro flowers, in dense masses of deep yellow, carpet the earth; and the dark pine forests on the mountain-slopes stare, while yellow streaks sweep up among the dusky timber.  In the distance we catch a glimpse of the eastern slope of the Sandia range glistening in the bright yellow hue of the flowers that cover miles of its slanting surface.