“These ruins form the most imposing pile of masonry yet [1875] found in Colorado. The whole group covers an area about 480,000 square feet, and has an average depth of from 3 to 4 feet. This would give in the vicinity of 1,500,000 solid feet of stonework. The stone used is chiefly of the fossiliferous limestone that outcrop along the base of the Mesa Verde a mile or more away, and its transportation to this place has doubtless been a great work for a people so totally without facilities. “The upper house is rectangular, measuring 80 feet by 100 feet, and is built with the cardinal points to within a few degrees. The pile is from 12 to 15 feet in height, and its massiveness suggests an original height at least twice as great. The plan is somewhat difficult to make out on account of the very great quantity of _débris_. “The walls seem to have been double, with a space 7 feet between; a number of cross-walls at regular intervals indicate that this space has been divided into apartments, as seen in the plan. “The walls are 26 inches thick, and are built of roughly dressed stones, which were probably laid in mortar, as in other cases. “The enclosed space, which is somewhat depressed, has two lines of _débris_, probably the remains of partition-walls, separating it into three apartments, _a_, _b_, _c_ [note]. Enclosing this great house is a network of fallen walls, so completely reduced that none of the stones seem to remain in place; and I am at a loss to determine whether they mark the site of a cluster of irregular apartments, having low, loosely built walls, or whether they are the remains of some imposing adobe structure built after the manner of the ruined pueblos of the Rio Chaco. “Two well-defined circular enclosures or _estufas_ [kivas] are situated in the midst of the southern wing of the ruin. The upper one, A, is on the opposite side of the spring from the great house, is 60 feet in diameter, and is surrounded by a low stone wall. West of the house is a small open court, which seems to have had a gateway opening out to the west, through the surrounding walls. “The lower house is 200 feet in length by 180 in width, and its walls vary 15 degrees from the cardinal points. The northern wall, _a_, is double and contains a row of eight apartments about 7 feet in width by 24 in length. The walls of the other sides are low, and seem to have served simply to enclose the great court, near the center of which is a large walled depression (_estufa_ B).”