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170
Written for Burke’s Weekly.
THE YOUNG EXPLORERS;
OR, BOY-UPS m TEXAS.
BY JOHN C. bUVAL,
Author of “ Jack Dobell; or, A Boy's Ad
ventures in Texas," “ The Adventures
of Big-Foot TV all ace," etc
CHAPTER XX.
The Canon and Valley de Uvalde —A Magni
ficent View—How the Valley took its Name —
Trip to the "Sugar Loaf ” Mountain — Wil
lie Takes Formal Possession—A Singular
Pit Discovered —A Good Dinner and Good
Appetites— Uncle Seth’s Opinion of the Sil
ver Mine.
iIiHE next morning, after an
'early breakfast, we saddled
id r our horses, and “rolled out,”
taking our way up the Sabinal, towards
the Canon de Uvalde, some seven or
eight miles distant. The country we
passed over was rugged and broken,
and intersected in some places by deep
gulches, which we found very difficult
to cross; but at length we reached the
pass, and began to ascend the high
rocky hills that shut in the Canon de
Uvalde, along a narrow path, scarcely
wide enough in some places for two
horses to travel abreast. After toiling
up this rugged pass for about half an
hour, we at length came to the highest
point of it, and the whole valley of
Uvalde ijurst at once upon our view—
extending towards the north as far as
the eye could reach, and surrounded
on all sides by high rocky hills, covered
with stunted cedar, and other species of
evergreen shrubs. Upon a little level
plateau of ground, on the very apex of
the hill we had ascended, we huddled
up together and halted a moment to
look at the beautiful valley spread out
like a map before us. It was indeed a
charming and- romantic scene that pre
sented itself to our sight—one that I
had never seen surpassed, even among
the valleys and mountains ol the far
famed Blue Ridge of Virginia.
The valley, as we ascertained after
wards, is about twenty-five miles in
length, and from three to five in
breadth. The Sabinal, a beautiful,
clear little stream, meanders through
it in regular curves, from one side to
the other, its whole course, from the
high point where we then stood, being
plainly marked out by the dark foliage
of the tall cypress trees that every
where grew along its banks. The val
ley itself was undulating, though not
broken; and its surface was thickly
dotted with clumps and groves of live
oaks, elms, peccans, and other forest
trees. Far away up the valley, Uncle
Seth pointed out to us some dark
looking objects on the prairie, which
he thought were either wild horses or
buffaloes ; but they were such a long
way off, he could not say certainly
what animals they were.
Descending by a narrow, crooked
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trail, very similar to the one we had
travelled up, we at length reached the
valley, and crossing over to the wrest
ern side, we encamped near the Sabi
nal, in a large grove of peccan trees, a
few hundred yards above where the
stream makes its way jin a narrow
canon, through the hills at the southern
extremity. This canon, as we subse
quently found out, was impassable,
even for a man on foot, for the bed of
the stream was obstructed by innumer
able huge boulders, which had rolled
down from the cliffs above, and was
hemmed in on both sides by perpendi
cular walls of rock, several hundred
feet in height. In fact, as we ascer
tained by subsequent examination, the
valley could only be entered at two
points—through the pass we had just
traversed, and by a similar one at its
northern termination. Everywhere else
we encountered precipitous walls of
rock, broken and jagged, and covered —
wherever the inclination was not too
great for the accumulation of soil—with
a dense growth of chaparral or thorny
shrubs. In same places, little clear
streams of water, flowing from numer
ous springs in the surrounding hills,
trickled down the face of these walls of
rock, and sparkled in the sunlight like
veins of molten silver.
The valley took its name from a
Spanish officer, Uvalde, who it is said,
soon after the first settlement of the
'Spaniards in Texas, surprised a large
party of Comanche warriors in it, and,
having taken the precaution to station
a guard at both of the passes, he mas
sacred all of them, not one Indian being
left to tell the tale. At any rate, this
is the Mexican tradition concerning the
affair, and it is universally credited by
them. In the peccan grove where we
had stopped, we found the remains of
what had been a large Indian encamp
ment-broken lodge poles, numerous
pits in which they had barbecued their
buffalo humps and bears’ heads, and
quantities of bones and other offal scat
tered about in every direction ; but the
sign was all old, showing that the en
campment had been abandoned for
many mouths previous to our coming.
About half a mile apparently to the
east of the grove in which we had
pitched our camp, we noticed a singu
lar-looking “sugar loaf” mountain,
rising abruptly from the plain ; and as
soon as we had staked our animals, Mr.
Pitt, Lawrence, Willie and myself start
ed out to make a reconnoisance of it.
Before leaving, Uncle Seth, as usual,
warned us to be cautious, and keep on
the watch for Indians; “for,” said he,
“though the chances are that there’s
none in the valley now, as we have
seed no fresh sign, yit you must larn,
boys, to be always on your guard when
you are in the Ingen couutry, for when
you least expect ’em, there the dratted
varmints are sure to be.”
We promised Uncle Seth to keep a
* good look out, and started towards the
mountain. But instead of finding it
half a mile distant, by the time we
reached the foot of it we found we had
travelled at least two miles, so much
had we been deceived as to its real
distance. Three sides of the mountain
were almost perpendicular, but the
fourth was somewhat more sloping, and
we determined to climb up to the top
of it, and see what was to be seen from
that commanding eminence. Deposit
ing our rifles in a shallow cave at the
base, we began to climb the mountain,
which in some places even on that side
was so steep that we had to pull our
selves up by the projecting corners of
the rock and the stunted bushes that
grew in its crevices. At length, after
considerable difficulty, we gained the
top, and the view we had from that
elevated position amply repaid us for
all our toil and labor. We could see
the whole valley spread out before us;
and near at hand —so near apparently
that it seemed as if we could almost
have thrown a stone into it —lay our
camp in the peccan grove, our horses
picketted around, and the smoke from
the fire curling up above the tops of the
trees. The mountain terminated at the
summit in a sharp cone, formed of a
single flat rock, not more than twenty
five or thirty feet in diameter. Around
the edges of this we noticed a number
of loose boulders, and we amused our
selves for some time by rolling them
down the sides of,the mountain. It was
glorious fun to see them pitching over
the steep declivities, like an avalanche,
gathering*momentum~as they descend
ed, until at last, crashing with terrible
force through everything that stood in
their way, they went smoking and
bounding out upon the plain below.
“Boys,” said Willie, “if we only
had a good supply of ‘donnecks’ up
here, we could whip the whole Coman
che nation, if they were to attack us.”
“No doubt of it,” said Lawrence;
“but suppose they were to pitch their
camp just beyond the range of our
rocks, and wait for us to come down
for water or something to eat, what
then ? ”
“Oh, they certainly wouldn’t be so
unreasonable as not to give us a chance
to roll our rocks at ’em,” said Willie;
“but speaking of something to eat, re
minds me that I am as hungry as a
wolf, and I move that we get down out
of this, and make tracks for camp.”
Willie’s motion was seconded by all;
but before we began the descent, he
pulled off an old red flannel shirt he
had on, which he tied to one end of the
longest stick he could find, and firmly
planted the other in a crevice of the
rock.
“There,” said he, when he had fixed
his banner “ on the outer walls” to his
satisfaction, “I formally take posses
sion of the Canon de Uvalde, in the
name of Sam Houston, the President
of the Republic of Texas.”
Giving three cheers to Willie’s ban-
ner, which flaunted out bravely in the
breeze, we began the descent to the
valley, which we found even more dif
ficult than the ascent; and before we
reached the bottom, we had each had a
tumble or two, but without any serious
injury to any of us.
Shouldering our guns again, we start
ed in the direction of camp, but had
gone only a few yards from the base of
the mountain, when we came across a
deep pit, into which several of us were
very near tumbling, as its mouth was
almost wholly concealed by the thick
bushes that grew about it. Around the
mouth jof thejpit"were mounds of scoria
or rubbish, and a short distance from
it we noticed the remains of what had
once evidently been a furnace. The
pit was perhaps twenty feet deep, and
on one side of it we discovered a rude
ladder leaning against the wall. Mr.
Pitt endeavored to descend to the bot
tom by means of this ladder, but after
going down a few feet, he found it was
so rickettyjand hejwas__afraid
to venture further, and came back.
Mr. Pitt was the only one among us
whoj pretended to any knowledge of
such things, and after some further ex
amination, he came to the conclusion
that the pit was the entrance or shaft
of a mine that had been worked many
years previously —probably by the Spa
niards—but what sort of metal they had
extracted from it he was unable to say
positively; though, from the app •*'*“*""
ance of some of they're scattered ablaut,
he was inclined to think that it was a
silver mine. He took several small
pieces of the ore, and put them in his
shot pouch, intending, as he said, to
have them assayed the first opportu
nity ; but unfortunately he lost them
before we got back to the settlements.
I have never visited the Canon de
Uvalde since that time; nor do I know
whether or not any one ever subse
quently discovered this mine. It can
be easily found, however, as it is only
a few yards from the north-eastern base
of the sugar loaf mountain.
Returning to camp, we reached it,
much to our satisfaction, just as Cudjo
had finished dishing up dinner; for our
scramble up and down the mountain,
and our walk to and from it, had given
us all a famous appetite. The dinner
consisted of hot coffee, bear steaks,
hard tack, and wild artichokes, of which
last great quantities were found growing
in the vicinity of our camp ; and after
we had each drank a quart of strong
coffee, and partaken of the solids in
proportion, we would not have been the
least afraid to have tackled Mont Blanc
itself, if it had been handy to us.
We told Uncle Seth about the mine
we had discovered ; and he said that
the Mexicans had often told him that
the Spaniards, a great many years ago,
had worked silver mines in the Canon,
but he did not know that any of them
had ever been found, unless the pit we
had seen that day should turn out to be