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Show 190 BY PATH AND TRAIL. the inspired author of Ecclesiasticus : " Is there any thing whereof it may be said: see, this is new; it hath been already of old time, which was before us." Almost within gunshot of where I sit repose in solitary isola tion a group of buildings, the despair of antiquarians and historically very old. The central building is a large edifice, whose adobe walls have resisted for many centu ries the erosion of time, the abrasion of drifting sand and the wear and tear of torrential storms. This is the now historic ' ' Casa Grande ' ' or Great House, so named by the early Spanish explorers. Its walls are almost oriented to the four cardinal points, built of adobe blocks of unequal length and laid with symmetry in a cement of the same composition as the walls. This famous group of ruins rests on a raised plateau, about two miles to the south of the Gila river, in the midst of a thick growth of mesquite. Many of the buildings, from two to four stories high, are now roofed and kept in repair by the United States government, and are included in the pro tected governmental reserves. Around the principal buildings are heaps of ruins and many acres of shapeless debris, all that remain of an ancient Indian town or pueblo that was abandoned long before the daring Span iard, Francisco de Coronado, in 1540, entered Arizona. It was through this wild and mystic region that Padre Marcos made his weird expedition in 1539 in quest of the elusive seven cities of Cibola. In his report of his ex plorations he mentions the great buildings, then known to the Pima tribe by its Indian name of ' l Chichilitical. ' ' Here, too, after wandering over thousands of miles of mountains and barren deserts, passed the daring adven turers and explorers, Pedro de Tehan, Lopez de Car-dines and Cabezza de Vaca, the solitary survivors of Nar- |