Arroyo de Guaynopa yawned on our left. We slowly ascended a beautiful
cordon running toward the southwest. The track we followed, our guide
assured us, was _el camino de los antiguos_, but it probably was
only an Apache trail. The cordon was rather narrow, and from time
to time gave us sweeping views of the stupendous landscape in one
direction or another, as the animals slowly made their way up and
finally reached the summit. A grandly beautiful sight awaited us;
we went a little out of our way to gain a promontory, which, our
guide said, was designated "Punto Magnifico." It was at an elevation
of 8,200 feet, and gave us certainly the most strikingly magnificent
view of the Sierra Madre we yet had enjoyed.

An ocean of mountains spread out before and below us. In the midst
of it, right in front of us, were imposing pine-clad mesas and two
weathered pinnacles of reddish conglomerate, while further on there
followed range after range, peak after peak; the most distant ones,
toward the south, seeming at least as far as eighty miles away. The
course of the rivers, as they flow deep down between the mountains,
was pointed out to us. The principal one is the Arros River, which
from the west embraces most of the mesas, and then, turning south,
receives its tributaries, the Tutuhuaca and the Mulatos, the latter
just behind a pinnacle. West of the Arros River stretches out the
immense Mesa de los Apaches, once a stronghold of these marauders,
reaching as far as the Rio Bonito. The plateau is also called "The
Devil's Spine Mesa," after a high and very narrow ridge, which rises
conspicuously from the mesa's western edge and runs in a northerly
and southerly direction, like the edge of a gigantic saw. To our
amazement, the guide here indicated to us where the camino real from
Nacori passes east over a gap in the "Devil's Spine" ridge, and then
over several sharp buttes that descend toward the mesa. An odd-looking