They looked down upon the smoke of a manufactory chimney, upon strange heaps of material and curious engines scattered along the sands, with here and there moving specks of human figures.

In a little bay a schooner swung at her cables.
The vaquero crossed himself in stupefied alarm.

"I know not, your reverence; it is only two years ago, before the rodeo, that I was here for strayed colts, and I swear by the blessed bones of San Antonio that it was as I said." "Ah! it is like these Americanos," responded the muleteer.

"I have it from my brother Diego that he went from San Jose to Pescadero two months ago, across the plains, with never a hut nor fonda to halt at all the way.

He returned in seven days, and in the midst of the plain there were three houses and a mill, and many people.