ollars' worth
of property. It is with great labor that the people of Taos bring
their crops to perfection, as it is necessary to irrigate the
soil, unless the season, which is rarely the fact, is favorable in
furnishing rains to them. There are no fences to divide one man's
possessions from another's; but, by common law, they furnish shepherds
to guard their flocks and cattle and keep them from trespassing. The
climate is very severe during the winter season, but in the summer
it is delightful. The health of this community is wonderfully good.
Indeed, the only severe diseases they have to contend against are
brought on by vices. Excluding small pox, and the lesser complaints
among young children, no epidemics are known. The country is so
elevated and inland, that the air is dry and salubrious, and the "dew
point" is rarely reached so as to amount to anything. It may be well
to add here, that for the consumptive patient, in the early stages of
the disease, there is no such climate in the world to visit, as that
of New Mexico; but, as a matter of course, he must vary his location
with the changes of temperature, being governed by the seasons. The
winter in Taos is too severe for him; then, he must go South, towards,
or even to El Paso, where it is congenial to his disease. I prophesy
that some day our internal continent will be the "Mecca" for pilgrims
with this disease.

The dress of the New Mexican is the same as in Old Mexico. The peasant
wears his _sombrero_ and his everlasting blanket, which serves him
as a coat, and a covering by night. He rarely has but one suit of
clothes, which are put on new and worn until they are of no further
use. By amalgamating with the Americans, they are gradually
changing their style of dress. The buckskin pants, which were
characteristically cut and ornamented, are giving way to the ordinary
cloth ones of his white companion. It is so with the blanket, which is
being shed for the coat; and, again, this is true with the moccasin,
which is being replaced by the leathern shoe. The dress of the female
has undergone the same alteration. From almost a state of nudity,
they have been raised to a position from which they look upon silk
and satin with a "_connoisseur's_ eye." When New Mexico was part
and parcel of the domain of Old Mexico, Taos was the seat of much
smuggling from the United States, and many an apparent pack of grain
drawn into the town has been nothing less than packages of dom