The ruins in Northern Mexico, including New Mexico and Arizona, consist chiefly, as already stated, of the remains of structures similar in general design and purpose to those of the Village Indians, the Pueblos. In the more ancient times, doubtless, as at present, a large proportion of the dwellings and other edifices, like those in the Mississippi Valley, were built of perishable materials which have left no trace. Many of them, however, were built of stone, and have left ruins which show their character. Stone ruins are common in this northern region, although wood and adobe seems to have been more commonly used as building material. Some of the ruined stone edifices were inhabited when the country was conquered by the Spaniards. The remains present every where the same characteristics. They represent a people who built always in the same way, with some variations in the forms of their structures, and had substantially the same condition of life; but the ruins are not all of the same age. Their character can be sufficiently shown by describing a few of them. In New Mexico, west of the Rio Grande, between the head waters of the San Jose and Zuni rivers, a bluff or ridge rises in a valley two hundred feet high. The Spaniards named it “El Moro.” One side of this bluff is vertical, and shows yellowish-white sandstone rock, on the face of which are inscriptions; “Spanish inscriptions and Indian hieroglyphics.” It was carefully described in 1849 by Lieutenant Simpson, and was explored again four or five years later by Lieutenant A. W. Whipple, who described it in his report to the government, published in the third volume of “Explorations and Surveys for a Railroad Route to the Pacific.” On the summit of this height, which Lieutenant Simpson named “Inscription Rock,” are the ruins of an extensive Pueblo edifice built of stone. The walls were built “with considerable skill.” In some places they are still “perfect to the height of six or eight feet, vertical, straight, and smooth; and the masonry is well executed, the stones being of uniform size--about fourteen inches long and six wide.” The layers are horizontal, each successive layer breaking joints with that below it. Remains of cedar beams were discovered, and also obsidian arrow-heads, painted pottery, and other relics. Another ruin was seen on a height across the gorge. It was found to be similar to this, both in character and condition of decay. Lieutenant Whipple went westward along the thirty-fifth parallel. We can not do better than follow the report of what he saw. [Illustration: Fig. 20.--Pueblo Ruin at Pecos.]