their horses caparisoned, nearly alike.
Their dress is of the simplest and scantiest kind--a hip-cloth swathing
their bodies from waist to mid-thigh, closely akin to the "breech-clout"
of the Northern Indian, only of a different material. Instead of
dressed buckskin, the loin covering of the Chaco savage is a strip of
white cotton cloth, some of wool in bands of bright colour having a very
pretty effect. But, unlike their red brethren of the North, they know
nought of either leggings or moccasin. Their mild climate calls not for
such covering; and for foot protection against stone, thorn, or thistle,
the Chaco Indian rarely ever sets sole to the ground--his horse's back
being his home habitually.

Those now making way through the wood show limbs naked from thigh to
toe, smooth as moulded bronze, and proportioned as if cut by the chisel
of Praxiteles. Their bodies above also nude; but here again differing
from the red men of the prairies. No daub and disfigurement of chalk,
charcoal, vermilion, or other garish pigment; but clear skins showing
the lustrous hue of health, of bronze or brown amber tint, adorned only
with some stringlets of shell beads, or the seeds of a plant peculiar to
their country.

All are mounted on steeds of small size, but sinewy and perfect in
shape, having long tails and flowing manes; for the barbarism of the
clipping shears has not yet reached these barbarians of the Chaco.

Nor yet know they, or knowing, they use not saddle. A piece of ox-hide,
or scrap of deer-skin serves them for its substitute; and for bridle a
raw-hide rope looped around the under jaw, without head-strap, bittless,
and single reined, enabling them to check or guide their horses, as if
these were controlled by the cruellest of curbs, or the jaw-breaking
Mameluke bitt.

As they file forth two by two into the open ground, it is seen that
there is some quality and fashion common to all; to wit, that they are
all youths--not any of them over twenty--and that they wear their hair
cropped in front, showing a square line across the forehead, but left
untouched on the crown and back of the head. There it falls in full
profuseness, reaching to the hips, and in the case of some mingling with
the tails, of their horses.

Two, however, are notably different from the rest; they riding in the
advance, with a horse's length or so of interval between them and their
following. One of the two differs only in the style of his dres