[Illustration: THE HODGE PARTY.]

[Illustration: INDIAN RELICS.]

The discovery of pieces of pottery here does not of itself prove
great advancement in the race that made them; for, curiously enough,
the manufacture of rude pottery is one of the first steps taken by
man from a savage to a semi-civilized state. The various races of
mankind have usually reached this art soon after their discovery of
fire. In fact, such an invention is almost inevitable. Thus, an early
method of cooking food has always been to put it into a basket
smeared with clay, which is supported over a fire. The clay served
the double purpose of preventing liquids from escaping and protecting
the basket from the flame. Now, even the dullest savage could not
have failed to notice, after a time, that the clay became hardened by
the fire, and in that state was sufficient for his purpose without
the basket. Simple as it seems, the discovery of this fact marks an
important epoch in the progress of every primitive race, and some
authorities on ethnology distinguish the two great divisions of
Savagery and Barbarism by placing in the lower grade those who have
not arrived at the knowledge of making pottery.

[Illustration: THE TOP OF THE MESA ENCANTADA.]

[Illustration: THE APPROACH TO ÁCOMA.]

Soon after passing this haunted rock, and driving further over the
_mesa_-dotted plain, we came in sight of the weird city of the sky
called Ácoma. It occupies the summit of a table-land, the ascent to
which is now a winding defile, flanked by frowning cliffs. Even this