once had been well cultivated.

"I guess these people grew maize up here. You can see where the soil has
been turned over," said Jim. "Look here, boys, I have found an old
plow."

We looked at it with real curiosity. It was certainly a primitive
article, made of grey weathered wood and the plowshare also of some hard
wood, just enough to stir the ground.

"These people must have been independent here and happy too," said Tom.
"It was a shame they had to be run out by those Apaches."

We had now advanced to the edge of the mesa and were looking off to the
west. It was a marvelous view in the afternoon light that brought out
the strange and symmetrical lines of the desert architecture with
startling distinctness.

"There rolls the Colorado and hears no sound save its own rolling," said
Jim, pointing in his most oratorical manner to the southwest.

"You can see the zigzag of it through that plateau," I cried.

"Yes, and way over there in the south is where it plunges into the
mountains," said Jim. "Jove! it makes me anxious to reach it. This will
be our last picnic till we reach the river, you can count on that."

"Down, boys, quick!" cried Tom. We dropped into some brush--scrub bushes
that grew near the edge of the mesa without waiting to question. Tom's
eyes were keen and his vision was to be respected.

"What is it, brother?" inquired Jim, in mock anxiety. "What dost thou
see?"

"See! there is a party of Indians coming out around that butte over
there," pointing to the north. Then we saw them all right. There was a
large party, we could tell that. Though the distance was so great that
they looked like moving specks.

CHAPTER XIV

A NIGHT ON THE MESA

"Do you suppose they saw us?" I asked.

"Hardly," replied Jim. "It's all we can do to make them out and they are
mounted."

"It's lucky we stopped off here," remarked Tom, "because we would have
run into them or at least they would have cut our trail."

"If they go east of the mesa they will do it anyway," I said, "then what
will we do?"

"They would have a sweet time getting up here after us," said Jim.

"But they would starve us out," I said.

"Don't worry, Jo," Jim replied. "If they insist on hanging around we
will have to turn farmers and till the soil. You and Tom would make a
nice team to pull that plow, being twins; you are well matched, light
bays, warranted kind and gentle."

"Any lady could drive, especially Tom," I said.

"I d